Somewhere, in another universe in another dimension, I am not a middle school teacher.
In the waning days of Intenstitute, our kids were asked a series of questions about us, and the results were compiled in a PowerPoint that we were shown on our last day at Agua Fria.
When asked what my greatest strength is as a teacher, the answer was "He has a ton of energy." I took that as a huge compliment.
When asked what I could do better, the answer was "Nothing, keep doing what you're doing." I took that as an even huger compliment.
When asked what I would be doing if I weren't a teacher the answer was "Librarian."
There were giggles in the room. I was surprised at first, but then remember that, as an English teacher, being called a librarian is pretty cool. At least they know I like books.
Then I remember that I used to BE a librarian; I worked for two and a half years at the UNC Music Library. They obviously have a sixth sense for these things.
So then it all made sense to me - in some alternate universe, I am not a middle school teacher. I am a librarian. And I am OK with that - kind of. They said another teacher, Erica, would be a "cool librarian". Apparently, I would be a not-as-cool librarian. Womp, womp.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
"Mr. Boyle is Awesome!"
Institute was five weeks long; the kids were in the actual Ninth Grade Success program for four of those weeks. Not a long time.
But since TFA is soooo data-driven, they found time, in the second week of instruction, to fit in a midterm exam. We actually started planning it after only four days of teaching. This was to give us a good pulse check to see where our students were, what we had accomplished thus far, and to identify any gaps in what we had done to that point in the classroom.
I know it’s a little odd for me to write about the midterm when they’ve already taken the final and Institute is already over, but the midterm turned out to be great for me, and it actually came at the perfect time. I had struggled the two lessons before with my writing instruction – the kids just weren’t getting it, and the really didn’t like to write – I was wearing thin. But in life, there always seems to be those moments that pick you up when you need them to most, that get you back on track towards success, and that revive your mind and spirit when you need it most.
I’ve never enjoyed midterm exams, so who’d’ve thunk that the midterm exam would be one of those moments for me?
I was already relieved, since I wouldn’t be giving a writing lesson and would be administering the test, instead, so I could regroup and find ways to better focus my writing instruction. My only goals for the day were to invest the students in the test, and to make sure they actually took the damn thing without any mishaps.
Test days are fun days.
So they come back from lunch, and they’re always a bit rowdy when they come back from lunch, so I decided to channel that energy into something positive. I’ve mentioned a few times that, in some cases, no one has ever really told these kids how good they are, or how well they can do, so I decided we would take some investment time and do just that.
They walk in, and with all of my built up Intenstitute crazy energy, I run around the room and point at each of them shouting “You’re awesome! And YOU’RE awesome! And YOU’RE awesome! And Jonathan’s awesome! And Melissa’s AWESOME!”
If anyone has seen my adaptation of Dave Cook’s “Humpback Whale” routine, you can visualize that and have a pretty good idea of what was going on in J4.
Well, they got super into it. They started pointing at each other and shouting “You’re awesome! And you’re awesome! And I’m awesome!”
The best part was when Melissa pointed at me and shouted “And Mr. Boyle is awesome!”
YES! Greatest triumph as a teacher to that point. I was super proud. It’s a great feeling to know you have actually reached your kids as a teacher. One of the best feelings I can think of.
I then made all of them stand up and shout with me “I…AM…AWESOME!”
Maybe no one had told any of them they were awesome before, but it’s the little things that seem to make the biggest difference. The kids sat down, took their midterms – and performed astoundingly. 86% mastery of objectives!
We were so proud of them – our hard work, and their hard work – had paid off. Two students even got 100% on the exam.
Not only did they find my awesome, but they apparently found my class awesome too, and showed amazing progress on the midterm.
I mentioned earlier that my moods were strongly tied to my performance in the classroom – I was on cloud nine that day.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
But since TFA is soooo data-driven, they found time, in the second week of instruction, to fit in a midterm exam. We actually started planning it after only four days of teaching. This was to give us a good pulse check to see where our students were, what we had accomplished thus far, and to identify any gaps in what we had done to that point in the classroom.
I know it’s a little odd for me to write about the midterm when they’ve already taken the final and Institute is already over, but the midterm turned out to be great for me, and it actually came at the perfect time. I had struggled the two lessons before with my writing instruction – the kids just weren’t getting it, and the really didn’t like to write – I was wearing thin. But in life, there always seems to be those moments that pick you up when you need them to most, that get you back on track towards success, and that revive your mind and spirit when you need it most.
I’ve never enjoyed midterm exams, so who’d’ve thunk that the midterm exam would be one of those moments for me?
I was already relieved, since I wouldn’t be giving a writing lesson and would be administering the test, instead, so I could regroup and find ways to better focus my writing instruction. My only goals for the day were to invest the students in the test, and to make sure they actually took the damn thing without any mishaps.
Test days are fun days.
So they come back from lunch, and they’re always a bit rowdy when they come back from lunch, so I decided to channel that energy into something positive. I’ve mentioned a few times that, in some cases, no one has ever really told these kids how good they are, or how well they can do, so I decided we would take some investment time and do just that.
They walk in, and with all of my built up Intenstitute crazy energy, I run around the room and point at each of them shouting “You’re awesome! And YOU’RE awesome! And YOU’RE awesome! And Jonathan’s awesome! And Melissa’s AWESOME!”
If anyone has seen my adaptation of Dave Cook’s “Humpback Whale” routine, you can visualize that and have a pretty good idea of what was going on in J4.
Well, they got super into it. They started pointing at each other and shouting “You’re awesome! And you’re awesome! And I’m awesome!”
The best part was when Melissa pointed at me and shouted “And Mr. Boyle is awesome!”
YES! Greatest triumph as a teacher to that point. I was super proud. It’s a great feeling to know you have actually reached your kids as a teacher. One of the best feelings I can think of.
I then made all of them stand up and shout with me “I…AM…AWESOME!”
Maybe no one had told any of them they were awesome before, but it’s the little things that seem to make the biggest difference. The kids sat down, took their midterms – and performed astoundingly. 86% mastery of objectives!
We were so proud of them – our hard work, and their hard work – had paid off. Two students even got 100% on the exam.
Not only did they find my awesome, but they apparently found my class awesome too, and showed amazing progress on the midterm.
I mentioned earlier that my moods were strongly tied to my performance in the classroom – I was on cloud nine that day.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
On the Name
So one of the facts about myself that I am super proud of is that I have traveled a ton; so much so, in fact, that I had extra pages added to my passport.
On these extra pages are inspirational phrases from American history. One is "Go west, young man, and grow with the country", attributed to Horace Greeley.
Since that happens to be exactly what I'm doing - going west and "growing" personally and professionally - I could not have picked a more perfect title to this blog.
Idle curiosity - and a need to remember the exact quotation - led me to the Wikipedia page for the saying.
Turns out, it's quite controversial. Greeley favored Western Expansion relating to Manifest Destiny, and that quotation apparently appeared in an 1865 editorial the famous journalist wrote advocating for the concept.
However, Greeley never claimed to have coined the famous phrase, and it's original author remains unknown, an enigma lost in the mists of history.
No matter who first said it or wrote it, the sentiment remains the same.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
On these extra pages are inspirational phrases from American history. One is "Go west, young man, and grow with the country", attributed to Horace Greeley.
Since that happens to be exactly what I'm doing - going west and "growing" personally and professionally - I could not have picked a more perfect title to this blog.
Idle curiosity - and a need to remember the exact quotation - led me to the Wikipedia page for the saying.
Turns out, it's quite controversial. Greeley favored Western Expansion relating to Manifest Destiny, and that quotation apparently appeared in an 1865 editorial the famous journalist wrote advocating for the concept.
However, Greeley never claimed to have coined the famous phrase, and it's original author remains unknown, an enigma lost in the mists of history.
No matter who first said it or wrote it, the sentiment remains the same.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Monday, July 26, 2010
Behind
When I was abroad and gallivanting all over the world during my junior year, I started journaling, and I really liked it. Problem was, I always had way too much to write about and not enough time, or maybe motivation, or hand strength what with the constant writing in small notebooks, to keep it up. I would always fall days behind and end up journaling about events that happened two months earlier. Yes, I do have a pretty good memory for those things, but it became too much, and I’m not going to follow that route with this blog.
But it seems like may be; I can never seem to find the time to blog, and when I do, I end up writing like thirteen entries at a time, and nothing is in chronological order, and I get confused, and sometimes I think y’all might, too.
So yes, I am a little behind in my blogging; my to-do list has “Blog” right on it, and there are 23 entries waiting in the wings for me to find some time to write.
Apologies, apologies, apologies for that. Hopefully I can find some sort of routine where I can actually update this on time, and sequentially, so you’ll have an idea of what it’s like to be in the trenches fighting the evil armies of the achievement gap pretty soon after I fight each battle, not weeks afterwards.
That’s my new Big Goal.
peace and love from seat 19E on us airways flight 480,
pb
But it seems like may be; I can never seem to find the time to blog, and when I do, I end up writing like thirteen entries at a time, and nothing is in chronological order, and I get confused, and sometimes I think y’all might, too.
So yes, I am a little behind in my blogging; my to-do list has “Blog” right on it, and there are 23 entries waiting in the wings for me to find some time to write.
Apologies, apologies, apologies for that. Hopefully I can find some sort of routine where I can actually update this on time, and sequentially, so you’ll have an idea of what it’s like to be in the trenches fighting the evil armies of the achievement gap pretty soon after I fight each battle, not weeks afterwards.
That’s my new Big Goal.
peace and love from seat 19E on us airways flight 480,
pb
It's Over
I know I haven’t really gotten to write too much about Intenstitute, at least the ins and outs of it, and hopefully some of that will come as I have time to continuously unwind from that pressure cooker. But now that FINALLY those five weeks are over, I can look back, and hopefully glean (Erin, that word’s for you) a few takeaways from the experience.
I went into Institute thinking it would be the toughest and most challenging thing I had ever done. Looking back on the experience a week after it ended, I can safely say that I think it was.
It wasn’t just the long hours, or the lack of sleep, or the intensity of it all; it was the fact that there was a lot actually riding on what I was doing. I was just going through training sessions and hours in the classroom for my own benefit; there were students who depended on me, for whom my failure was not an option at all, whose successes were directly linked to my successes or missteps as a teacher. I needed to succeed not just for myself, but for those students for whom success at the Agua Fria Ninth Grade Summer Success Program would mean, in the short-term, in some cases, promotion to high school, but hopefully in the long-term, and maybe this is just me reverting to John Lennon-esque “dreaming”, but better preparation for high school and, hopefully, beyond. Some of these kids had never thought about going to college before; some of them even considered dropping out literally as soon as they could. If I could invest and inspire at least a few of them to consider changing life paths, I think I did well.
So, on the balance, how did I do in the classroom? TFA is all about Big Goals (with appropriate, reverent capitalization); the Big Goal for everyone at Institute was that, in each of our classrooms, (Freudian note: I manage to type “classtooms” most of the time I try to write “classrooms”; interpret that how you will, but I think I just have clumsy fingers) each of our students would meet his or her Big Goal. Now, I know this is getting somewhat confusing, what with all the Big Goals running around, so I’ll attempt to explain: Each of our students had a Big Goal based on our pre-test; their Big Goals were based upon the results of the top quartile of last year’s Institute. Say, for example, you scored 50% mastery of objectives on the pre-test; your Big Goal for the post-test would be around a 76% mastery of objectives, or thereabouts. These are ambitious goals, all based upon what the cream of the crop of last year’s Corps was able to achieve with their students. So MY Big Goal was that ALL of my students would reach THEIR Big Goals. Make sense?
Sorry to get bogged down in the weeds of Big Goals, but that’s a lot of what TFA is all about. Throughout their lives, in many cases no one has believed that many of these kids could achieve to high levels, and we were there to break that mold, to set high standards, and to reach for them. So how did I do, going back to my original question? Well…alright. 4 of our 11 students met their Big Goals; not a great mark, but pretty much average for the Ninth Grade Summer Success Program. Overall, the class as a whole improved 11 points, from a 61% to a 72%, on the post-test; I think, for four weeks of teaching by novices, that’s awesome. On the pre-test, only 3 of 17 objectives were mastered by 80% or more of students; on the post-test, 9 of 17 objectives were mastered by more than 80% of the class, with 4 objectives reaching mastery by 100% of the students. Even though 100% of our kids didn’t meet 100% of their individual Big Goals, I think we did pretty damn well, considering.
Considering what? Well, although I certainly cared strongly about each of my students’ progress and achievement, and although I certainly know that all of them can achieve at a high level, I did not have the easiest class. It’s not like I had a ton of management problems; in fact, we had hardly any major management problems in J4. They were the SuperStars they were meant to be in that regard. But 6 – out of 11 – of my students were either students with special needs or English Language Learners. That’s an unheard-of level in a regular classroom, and that created an interesting dynamic in J4 – with no leading personalities, those facets of the class became dominant, and participation and processing were major struggles for us. Because there was no dominant personality to move the group, despite my best investment efforts, we had a very strange class dynamic, and the slower-processing typical of students with special needs and English Language Learners dominated the class instead.
My supervisors and mentors commented “Man, Peter, you’re not kidding – that’s a strange class.” When we took our “silly picture” at the end of the summer, only I did anything silly, and all I did was stick my tongue out. Everyone else is just standing there, awkwardly.
God I miss them.
I once made a joke, “Institute has made me a great dentist; I’m awesome at pulling teeth.” It was awkward, yes, and the timing was poor, but that kind of encapsulates how participation in my class was – getting them to talk was like pulling teeth from a toothless person. But I tried hard, I really did, and my energy level, in my opinion, was outstanding (that’s not, actually, just my opinion: one of my mentors commented that “Well, based on what I’ve seen you do, they SHOULD be participating and engaged – it’s an interesting dynamic”…yes, yes it was. And, most importantly, the kids noticed my energy too. On the last school meeting, we had a heart-wrenching slideshow of what our kids said about us. When prompted, my kids said their favorite thing about me was that I had a lot of energy – so I’m not really just making this up).
So yes, all things considered, I think I was able to do great things with my class.
Maybe the support was a little lacking at Institute for dealing with anomalous classes like mine, but that goes back to an important point: Institute has two major purposes, one of which, student achievement, I’ve just described in (hopefully not too boring) detail. The other is our own professional development; how can we Corps Members lead to student achievement if we don’t know at all what we’re doing?
In this regard, our individual Big Goals were to move from Novice to Beginning Proficiency on the Teaching as Leadership rubric – TFA’s teaching Bible. There are about forty-odd different facets of the TAL rubric (that’s another TFAcronym for ya); I did, indeed, move, with the incredibly support of all of the awesome mentors out here, to Beginning Proficiency in all aspects, and Advanced Proficiency in some.
What took the most work? Checking for understanding, which is the process of questioning during a lesson, is difficult. You have to ask the right questions, to the right students, and respond in the right ways to make sure your class is either on track, or, as frequently happens, is way off track and needs some more practice or guidance. It’s tough and there’s definitely an art to it. It’s difficult to know how to respond a way-off answer this a response that’s not “Umm, well that’s an interesting answer, Jimmy, but, yeah…you’re wrong” – you’ve got to finesse it to make sure Jimmy SEEMS right and then coach and correct him with guiding questions to get back on the right path…oh, it’s tough.
What were my standout strengths? I seem to have acquired a great classroom presence – teacher voice, teacher stare, the movement, the energy level, everything – and that, I think, is how a degree in international business can help a new teacher. Presentations, more presentations, and then some more presentations back at Carolina certainly helped in that regard.
So yes, I definitely developed professionally, and yes, my students definitely achieved. TFA achieved those two of its own Big Goals. BUT, there is another, important goal, one I discussed earlier.
You need to make friends at Institute too; in fact, it would be impossible to make it through this experience without a valuable and reliable support system. So the social aspect of Institute is huge, too, and I definitely have carved a niche for myself and made a ton of friends here, too.
So, that was Intenstitute, a week after it ended. Was it tough? Yes. Was it worth it? Hell yes, and I think my kids would agree. Going back to my original thoughts, was it the most challenging thing I had ever done? Yes. But I imagined it to be tougher – absolutely no sleep, no time for socialization, no chances to eat or sleep or work out or breathe. It came close, but I think I handled it well, established a routine that worked for me, and forged out support systems to get through it all.
It was definitely the most fun I would never like to repeat again.
peace and love from 30,000 feet above what i think is the lone star state,
pb
PS: Wow, this turned into a far longer post than expected. I guess that’s what five weeks of pent-up thoughts and reflections and data and exhaustion and Intenstitute will do to somebody.
And apologies for all of the data in this post; TFA is all about data, and it’s helpful to use data to reflect. Sorry if I bored y’all, but remember, this blog is about me doing some self-reflection, too!
I went into Institute thinking it would be the toughest and most challenging thing I had ever done. Looking back on the experience a week after it ended, I can safely say that I think it was.
It wasn’t just the long hours, or the lack of sleep, or the intensity of it all; it was the fact that there was a lot actually riding on what I was doing. I was just going through training sessions and hours in the classroom for my own benefit; there were students who depended on me, for whom my failure was not an option at all, whose successes were directly linked to my successes or missteps as a teacher. I needed to succeed not just for myself, but for those students for whom success at the Agua Fria Ninth Grade Summer Success Program would mean, in the short-term, in some cases, promotion to high school, but hopefully in the long-term, and maybe this is just me reverting to John Lennon-esque “dreaming”, but better preparation for high school and, hopefully, beyond. Some of these kids had never thought about going to college before; some of them even considered dropping out literally as soon as they could. If I could invest and inspire at least a few of them to consider changing life paths, I think I did well.
So, on the balance, how did I do in the classroom? TFA is all about Big Goals (with appropriate, reverent capitalization); the Big Goal for everyone at Institute was that, in each of our classrooms, (Freudian note: I manage to type “classtooms” most of the time I try to write “classrooms”; interpret that how you will, but I think I just have clumsy fingers) each of our students would meet his or her Big Goal. Now, I know this is getting somewhat confusing, what with all the Big Goals running around, so I’ll attempt to explain: Each of our students had a Big Goal based on our pre-test; their Big Goals were based upon the results of the top quartile of last year’s Institute. Say, for example, you scored 50% mastery of objectives on the pre-test; your Big Goal for the post-test would be around a 76% mastery of objectives, or thereabouts. These are ambitious goals, all based upon what the cream of the crop of last year’s Corps was able to achieve with their students. So MY Big Goal was that ALL of my students would reach THEIR Big Goals. Make sense?
Sorry to get bogged down in the weeds of Big Goals, but that’s a lot of what TFA is all about. Throughout their lives, in many cases no one has believed that many of these kids could achieve to high levels, and we were there to break that mold, to set high standards, and to reach for them. So how did I do, going back to my original question? Well…alright. 4 of our 11 students met their Big Goals; not a great mark, but pretty much average for the Ninth Grade Summer Success Program. Overall, the class as a whole improved 11 points, from a 61% to a 72%, on the post-test; I think, for four weeks of teaching by novices, that’s awesome. On the pre-test, only 3 of 17 objectives were mastered by 80% or more of students; on the post-test, 9 of 17 objectives were mastered by more than 80% of the class, with 4 objectives reaching mastery by 100% of the students. Even though 100% of our kids didn’t meet 100% of their individual Big Goals, I think we did pretty damn well, considering.
Considering what? Well, although I certainly cared strongly about each of my students’ progress and achievement, and although I certainly know that all of them can achieve at a high level, I did not have the easiest class. It’s not like I had a ton of management problems; in fact, we had hardly any major management problems in J4. They were the SuperStars they were meant to be in that regard. But 6 – out of 11 – of my students were either students with special needs or English Language Learners. That’s an unheard-of level in a regular classroom, and that created an interesting dynamic in J4 – with no leading personalities, those facets of the class became dominant, and participation and processing were major struggles for us. Because there was no dominant personality to move the group, despite my best investment efforts, we had a very strange class dynamic, and the slower-processing typical of students with special needs and English Language Learners dominated the class instead.
My supervisors and mentors commented “Man, Peter, you’re not kidding – that’s a strange class.” When we took our “silly picture” at the end of the summer, only I did anything silly, and all I did was stick my tongue out. Everyone else is just standing there, awkwardly.
God I miss them.
I once made a joke, “Institute has made me a great dentist; I’m awesome at pulling teeth.” It was awkward, yes, and the timing was poor, but that kind of encapsulates how participation in my class was – getting them to talk was like pulling teeth from a toothless person. But I tried hard, I really did, and my energy level, in my opinion, was outstanding (that’s not, actually, just my opinion: one of my mentors commented that “Well, based on what I’ve seen you do, they SHOULD be participating and engaged – it’s an interesting dynamic”…yes, yes it was. And, most importantly, the kids noticed my energy too. On the last school meeting, we had a heart-wrenching slideshow of what our kids said about us. When prompted, my kids said their favorite thing about me was that I had a lot of energy – so I’m not really just making this up).
So yes, all things considered, I think I was able to do great things with my class.
Maybe the support was a little lacking at Institute for dealing with anomalous classes like mine, but that goes back to an important point: Institute has two major purposes, one of which, student achievement, I’ve just described in (hopefully not too boring) detail. The other is our own professional development; how can we Corps Members lead to student achievement if we don’t know at all what we’re doing?
In this regard, our individual Big Goals were to move from Novice to Beginning Proficiency on the Teaching as Leadership rubric – TFA’s teaching Bible. There are about forty-odd different facets of the TAL rubric (that’s another TFAcronym for ya); I did, indeed, move, with the incredibly support of all of the awesome mentors out here, to Beginning Proficiency in all aspects, and Advanced Proficiency in some.
What took the most work? Checking for understanding, which is the process of questioning during a lesson, is difficult. You have to ask the right questions, to the right students, and respond in the right ways to make sure your class is either on track, or, as frequently happens, is way off track and needs some more practice or guidance. It’s tough and there’s definitely an art to it. It’s difficult to know how to respond a way-off answer this a response that’s not “Umm, well that’s an interesting answer, Jimmy, but, yeah…you’re wrong” – you’ve got to finesse it to make sure Jimmy SEEMS right and then coach and correct him with guiding questions to get back on the right path…oh, it’s tough.
What were my standout strengths? I seem to have acquired a great classroom presence – teacher voice, teacher stare, the movement, the energy level, everything – and that, I think, is how a degree in international business can help a new teacher. Presentations, more presentations, and then some more presentations back at Carolina certainly helped in that regard.
So yes, I definitely developed professionally, and yes, my students definitely achieved. TFA achieved those two of its own Big Goals. BUT, there is another, important goal, one I discussed earlier.
You need to make friends at Institute too; in fact, it would be impossible to make it through this experience without a valuable and reliable support system. So the social aspect of Institute is huge, too, and I definitely have carved a niche for myself and made a ton of friends here, too.
So, that was Intenstitute, a week after it ended. Was it tough? Yes. Was it worth it? Hell yes, and I think my kids would agree. Going back to my original thoughts, was it the most challenging thing I had ever done? Yes. But I imagined it to be tougher – absolutely no sleep, no time for socialization, no chances to eat or sleep or work out or breathe. It came close, but I think I handled it well, established a routine that worked for me, and forged out support systems to get through it all.
It was definitely the most fun I would never like to repeat again.
peace and love from 30,000 feet above what i think is the lone star state,
pb
PS: Wow, this turned into a far longer post than expected. I guess that’s what five weeks of pent-up thoughts and reflections and data and exhaustion and Intenstitute will do to somebody.
And apologies for all of the data in this post; TFA is all about data, and it’s helpful to use data to reflect. Sorry if I bored y’all, but remember, this blog is about me doing some self-reflection, too!
Thursday, July 22, 2010
174 Awesomes
No one seems to really know hoe many of us there are, but the number of TFA Phoenix 2010 Corps Members started around 177, and as far as anyone can tell, is now around 174.
174! 174 of us made the initial cut. 174 of us survived Intenstitute. That's pretty impressive.
Now, I really liked the Law & Public Policy Program at Towson High and the GLOBE Program at Carolina because those programs made a large institution small and were composed of like-minded passionate and talented individuals with the same goals and similar, awesome personalities.
And, for the most part, that's what the 2010 Phoenix TFA Corps is. 174 passionate, talented, and awesome people who picked up and moved to the desert to try and make a difference.
Not only is everyone super-smart and talented, but everyone was a complete all-star in college. But no matter what everyone's background may be, and the backgrounds here are VERY diverse, everyone is truly united under the TFA banner. We've all drunk the Kool-Aid, and call me corny, but it really is inspiring to truly be part of a movement of such amazing and dedicated and accomplished people trying to solve this massive problem of educational inequity. (Yeah, just gave y'all some major props)
And everyone is super fun. Be it road trips to Vegas or nights out on Mill, we always have a good time. Some of my best nights out are when all of us are out together, raging. Too much fun.
You've got all kinds here - but there are a TON of Midwesterners running around. I think I've met four Midwesterners in my entire life, maybe (you know who you are), and now they totally dominate the TFA 2010 Corps. I've gotten REALLY used to Midwestern accents.
Yeah, you've actually got all kinds here - remember the scene in Mean Girls when Lindsay Lohan (topical = just arrested) arrives at North Shore and Janice draws a map of the cafeteria, with all of the different cliques all mapped out? It's not that the Corps is a segregated bunch, but all of the cliques definitely exist. There's a large contingent of frat guys, your sorority girls, athletes, artsy folks, the people you never ever see and don't really know what to do, and then another group, that doesn't so much exist in a fictional high school: old people.
In the education world, their called "nontrads", I think: nontraditional teachers. We have a smattering of old people. Super passionate like the rest of us, yes, but certainly interesting to see in a dorm setting. The level of technology literacy definitely isn't there, that's for sure.
You know when you move someplace new, or when you go to a new school, you're always worried about whether or not you'll make any friends, and you picture yourself hating everything and sitting alone all the time? Well, that's not a concern here - it's great to be among such amazing company, and I'm definitely looking forward to the next two years with all these cool new friends.
peace and love from a quick mini-vacation back home to the old line state,
pb
174! 174 of us made the initial cut. 174 of us survived Intenstitute. That's pretty impressive.
Now, I really liked the Law & Public Policy Program at Towson High and the GLOBE Program at Carolina because those programs made a large institution small and were composed of like-minded passionate and talented individuals with the same goals and similar, awesome personalities.
And, for the most part, that's what the 2010 Phoenix TFA Corps is. 174 passionate, talented, and awesome people who picked up and moved to the desert to try and make a difference.
Not only is everyone super-smart and talented, but everyone was a complete all-star in college. But no matter what everyone's background may be, and the backgrounds here are VERY diverse, everyone is truly united under the TFA banner. We've all drunk the Kool-Aid, and call me corny, but it really is inspiring to truly be part of a movement of such amazing and dedicated and accomplished people trying to solve this massive problem of educational inequity. (Yeah, just gave y'all some major props)
And everyone is super fun. Be it road trips to Vegas or nights out on Mill, we always have a good time. Some of my best nights out are when all of us are out together, raging. Too much fun.
You've got all kinds here - but there are a TON of Midwesterners running around. I think I've met four Midwesterners in my entire life, maybe (you know who you are), and now they totally dominate the TFA 2010 Corps. I've gotten REALLY used to Midwestern accents.
Yeah, you've actually got all kinds here - remember the scene in Mean Girls when Lindsay Lohan (topical = just arrested) arrives at North Shore and Janice draws a map of the cafeteria, with all of the different cliques all mapped out? It's not that the Corps is a segregated bunch, but all of the cliques definitely exist. There's a large contingent of frat guys, your sorority girls, athletes, artsy folks, the people you never ever see and don't really know what to do, and then another group, that doesn't so much exist in a fictional high school: old people.
In the education world, their called "nontrads", I think: nontraditional teachers. We have a smattering of old people. Super passionate like the rest of us, yes, but certainly interesting to see in a dorm setting. The level of technology literacy definitely isn't there, that's for sure.
You know when you move someplace new, or when you go to a new school, you're always worried about whether or not you'll make any friends, and you picture yourself hating everything and sitting alone all the time? Well, that's not a concern here - it's great to be among such amazing company, and I'm definitely looking forward to the next two years with all these cool new friends.
peace and love from a quick mini-vacation back home to the old line state,
pb
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Sin City
A lot of my entries recently have been some heavy teaching stuff; let’s move on to some lighter topics.
And nothing is a lighter topic than Vegas, a city of such total and complete debauchery that naturally I cannot wait until I go back.
The thing about Vegas that one of my friends pointed out to me the other day was that everyone goes there to celebrate something – whether it’s blowing their most recent paycheck at the Roulette wheel or celebrating an engagement (which could easily become celebrating a marriage in that city’s innumerable wedding chapels) – so you know they’re gonna do it big.
Now I’m not a Vegas expert, but I have been to Sin City twice in the past month, and I certainly plan on becoming an expert sometime soon – why not? It’s a quick 5-and-a-half hour drive through the Mojave and over Lake Mead, and you’re there. (Out West, distance is relative – I would never say Charlotte and Raleigh are “close”, because they are two-and-a-half hours apart; but I do consider Tucson and Phoenix “close”, and they are the same distance away. So Vegas is “close enough” to Phoenix in that sense)
The Strip is awesome – open containers are totally fine; in fact, I think anything would be totally fine. It’s tough to walk though – even though the Venetian and Bellagio are like 2 blocks apart, those are llllooooonnnnngggg blocks to walk, especially if you’re all decked out and ready to hit the clubs (which of course you are, because you’re all my friends) There are pools, palaces, zoos, aquariums, slot parlors, designer shopping malls, a roller coaster, replicas of the CN Tower, Manhattan skyline, Camelot, Patong Beach, and the Eiffel Tower all on one simple street – it’s amazing they’ve created this oasis (or is it a mirage?) of glamour in the Nevada desert.
The casinos range from the happily kitsch Excalibur, where I stayed on my roadtrip, to the grand and palatial Bellagio and Caesar’s Palace. It all depends on what you’re looking for. And I love how each one has a schtick – if you want France, go to Paris. If you want China, head to the Imperial Palace. If you’re a poor teacher from Phoenix, go to the Travelodge (which I call the TroLo) – most terrifying hotel I have ever been to, and I include all Asian hostels in that statement.
So Vegas does indeed have something for everyone – shows and entertainment if you’re looking for a calm night; the world’s best clubs and bars if you’re not. Some of the best restaurants are in Vegas (I’m partial to San Marco’s at the Venetian and Le Burger Bistro at Paris); so are some of the world’s longest and trashiest buffets.
Vegas is party and glamour central if you’re young or a high-roller looking for a good time; it’s damned depressing if you’re not. Looking at old ladies spending all of their fixed incomes by listlessly lifting levers on slot machines in the midst of all the hullaballoo is sad as hell. And slots aren’t even fun.
It’s a city with a wild streak and a seedy underbelly –on the floor at one of the megacasinos, you wouldn’t be at all surprised to see George Clooney and the Ocean’s 11 crew enter one entrance as a CSI: crew leaves another.
It’s hyper, it’s neon, it’s silicone, it’s sunburned, it’s sandy, it’s gray, it’s throbbing, it’s alive – needless to say I love it.
Can’t wait to go back soon – next time to visit Alina!
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
And nothing is a lighter topic than Vegas, a city of such total and complete debauchery that naturally I cannot wait until I go back.
The thing about Vegas that one of my friends pointed out to me the other day was that everyone goes there to celebrate something – whether it’s blowing their most recent paycheck at the Roulette wheel or celebrating an engagement (which could easily become celebrating a marriage in that city’s innumerable wedding chapels) – so you know they’re gonna do it big.
Now I’m not a Vegas expert, but I have been to Sin City twice in the past month, and I certainly plan on becoming an expert sometime soon – why not? It’s a quick 5-and-a-half hour drive through the Mojave and over Lake Mead, and you’re there. (Out West, distance is relative – I would never say Charlotte and Raleigh are “close”, because they are two-and-a-half hours apart; but I do consider Tucson and Phoenix “close”, and they are the same distance away. So Vegas is “close enough” to Phoenix in that sense)
The Strip is awesome – open containers are totally fine; in fact, I think anything would be totally fine. It’s tough to walk though – even though the Venetian and Bellagio are like 2 blocks apart, those are llllooooonnnnngggg blocks to walk, especially if you’re all decked out and ready to hit the clubs (which of course you are, because you’re all my friends) There are pools, palaces, zoos, aquariums, slot parlors, designer shopping malls, a roller coaster, replicas of the CN Tower, Manhattan skyline, Camelot, Patong Beach, and the Eiffel Tower all on one simple street – it’s amazing they’ve created this oasis (or is it a mirage?) of glamour in the Nevada desert.
The casinos range from the happily kitsch Excalibur, where I stayed on my roadtrip, to the grand and palatial Bellagio and Caesar’s Palace. It all depends on what you’re looking for. And I love how each one has a schtick – if you want France, go to Paris. If you want China, head to the Imperial Palace. If you’re a poor teacher from Phoenix, go to the Travelodge (which I call the TroLo) – most terrifying hotel I have ever been to, and I include all Asian hostels in that statement.
So Vegas does indeed have something for everyone – shows and entertainment if you’re looking for a calm night; the world’s best clubs and bars if you’re not. Some of the best restaurants are in Vegas (I’m partial to San Marco’s at the Venetian and Le Burger Bistro at Paris); so are some of the world’s longest and trashiest buffets.
Vegas is party and glamour central if you’re young or a high-roller looking for a good time; it’s damned depressing if you’re not. Looking at old ladies spending all of their fixed incomes by listlessly lifting levers on slot machines in the midst of all the hullaballoo is sad as hell. And slots aren’t even fun.
It’s a city with a wild streak and a seedy underbelly –on the floor at one of the megacasinos, you wouldn’t be at all surprised to see George Clooney and the Ocean’s 11 crew enter one entrance as a CSI: crew leaves another.
It’s hyper, it’s neon, it’s silicone, it’s sunburned, it’s sandy, it’s gray, it’s throbbing, it’s alive – needless to say I love it.
Can’t wait to go back soon – next time to visit Alina!
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Moody Me
I’ve always been one to wear my moods on my sleeve, no matter what that mood may be – and this is especially true after a few drinks. But it’s crazy just how my moods can change based on what happens in class on a given day.
If a struggling student masters a key point on that day’s assessment, I can be ecstatic, so bubbly that my sobriety is called into question. If the quietest kid in the class asks a great and insightful question or volunteers to read that day’s passage, I get positively giddy. My kids’ successes are my successes, and it shows.
But unfortunately, the opposite is true to. If I’m having a rough day, and perhaps the kids don’t do as well on the assessment or maybe I have to give out a ton of consequences, it shows. I know I can’t take it personally; I know that being a teacher is just one aspect of my personality, and everyone has ups and downs, but this is definitely one aspect of the job on which I certainly struggle.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
If a struggling student masters a key point on that day’s assessment, I can be ecstatic, so bubbly that my sobriety is called into question. If the quietest kid in the class asks a great and insightful question or volunteers to read that day’s passage, I get positively giddy. My kids’ successes are my successes, and it shows.
But unfortunately, the opposite is true to. If I’m having a rough day, and perhaps the kids don’t do as well on the assessment or maybe I have to give out a ton of consequences, it shows. I know I can’t take it personally; I know that being a teacher is just one aspect of my personality, and everyone has ups and downs, but this is definitely one aspect of the job on which I certainly struggle.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Can’t Read My, Can’t Read My, No You Can’t Read My Teacher Face
One of the major perks about being a teacher that I’ve definitely mentioned in a previous post is the fact that there are 12 people in J4 at Agua Fria High School who have to do exactly what I tell them to, or there are major consequences. It’s instant gratification for the thousands of dollars my parents spent to get me a business degree; I’m already in a management position right off the bat. The only caveat is that the people I manage are…14 years old.
One of the major principles of classroom management is to keep a small problem a small problem. That is to say, don’t let the minor misbehaviors become major ones. If you let them get out their seats without asking once to sharpen a pencil, God knows you’ll have them running around the classroom in no time. If you let them make snarky side comments, God knows no one will ever pay attention to you ever again. Sweat the small stuff – make it stay small stuff.
This is the exact opposite of how I was while in school. My philosophy, pretty much about life in general, is that it is easier to ask forgiveness than permission. It’s totally true. So I did pretty much whatever I wanted in school and got away with murder because teachers liked me and I performed well so if I talked to my neighbors or left school midday to go get Taco Bell, so what, he’ll be back and ace the test.
I now hate that mentality, and endeavor to be the No-Nonsense Nurturer, a teacher that gets the behavior and investment messages across while keeping a friendly touch in the classroom.
The way we manage behavior at the Phoenix Institute is called the Behavior Management Cycle. It is propagated by an elderly education guru by the name of Lee Canter. We had to watch a million videos of Mr. Canter – he’s an awful public speaker and definitely does the “T-Rex” presenting pitfall (keeping his elbows at his side while vigorously moving his forearms) while presenting. But his methods are sounds, and I’ve found them incredibly helpful in my practice.
It works like this: first, give incredibly explicit directions. They may be in 9th grade, but kids have no idea what to do unless you explain it to them explicitly and clearly and model exactly how it should be done. I thought this was incredibly stupid at first (who doesn’t know how to work quietly and independently?) but it really is true – no one knows what to do unless someone teaches it to him or her, and that includes procedures and directions.
Next, focus on the positive and do something called Behavior Narration – that means, within two to three seconds of giving out an expectation or directions, you narrate what the kids are doing. An example would be that if you explicitly direct kids to get out of their desks and do a headstand against the back wall of the classroom for six minutes, three seconds after you give that direction you would say things like “Melissa is getting out of her seat and is going to do a headstand; Javier is at the back wall ready to do a headstand; Junior has started his headstand and will keep doing this for six minutes” etc.
It sounds corny and hilarious and it is. My CMA (that’s my mentor at Institute) thinks I’m good at it and it’s effective because I think it’s so funny. So I behavior narrate my ass off and have the best time, and here’s the crazy thing: it works! If one student is misbehaving (and trust me, you always have a kid who commits those irksome minor misbehaviors nonstop), behavior narrate all of the positive things the kids around him or her are doing, and eventually he’ll get the social cue and start doing it, too. Peer pressure works wonders.
But what if he or she doesn’t get it the first time around? Well, the third step of the Behavior Management Cycle is my least favorite: giving consequences. No one likes to be a “bad cop”; we all want our kids or coworkers or colleagues or employees to like us. But sometimes, you need to let them know they are out of line and need to step up their game, behavior-wise. An example:
“Stewie [I would laugh so hard if I ever teach a kid named Stewie], the expectation is that you are doing a headstand at the back wall of the classroom for six minutes. You have chosen to not follow the expectation, and this is your first warning, and it has been noted. Please get to the back wall and do a headstand for six minutes with the rest of the class.” (Of course I would do this in my best teacher voice – calm, confident, assertive, and leaving no doubt as to who is in charge of this classroom).
Giving consequences sucks; you never want to take away students’ privileges. In the case of Agua Fria J4, that would be chances to win a bathroom pass which we call StarBucks! (We took our SuperStars theme to the logical extreme – and beyond). However, sometimes you need to just remind them what the expectation is, and that they need to be following it. It totally makes class run that much smoother and decreases the chances that the misbehavior will happen again.
So that’s the formal way; I have, and I think all teachers do have, informal ways of keeping the kids in line. If the back right corner is chatting, go stand in the back right corner and conduct the lesson from there. Move around seats to ensure an optimal seating chart that minimizes misbehaviors. Put your hand on a student’s desk if he or she isn’t working – chances are he or she will snatch up that pencil and start writing so fast you won’t even get to behavior narration (which would be sad – I love to behavior narrate).
The best, however, and my favorite, is the Teacher Stare (hence the Gaga allusion at the title of this post). It’s cold, it’s piercing, it’s effective – and I’ve mastered it. If two kids are talking, just cock your head in their direction, purse your lips, fold your arms, and squint your eyes ever so slightly – their heads will be down and pencils will be moving so fast you have no idea. It’s actually an excellent power trip.
So that’s how I keep my class in line and avoid my worst nightmare – a class so out-of-control that they run circles around me and tie me to my chair with duct tape and pummel erasers at my forehead.
And that’s also how I put my management degree to good use.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
One of the major principles of classroom management is to keep a small problem a small problem. That is to say, don’t let the minor misbehaviors become major ones. If you let them get out their seats without asking once to sharpen a pencil, God knows you’ll have them running around the classroom in no time. If you let them make snarky side comments, God knows no one will ever pay attention to you ever again. Sweat the small stuff – make it stay small stuff.
This is the exact opposite of how I was while in school. My philosophy, pretty much about life in general, is that it is easier to ask forgiveness than permission. It’s totally true. So I did pretty much whatever I wanted in school and got away with murder because teachers liked me and I performed well so if I talked to my neighbors or left school midday to go get Taco Bell, so what, he’ll be back and ace the test.
I now hate that mentality, and endeavor to be the No-Nonsense Nurturer, a teacher that gets the behavior and investment messages across while keeping a friendly touch in the classroom.
The way we manage behavior at the Phoenix Institute is called the Behavior Management Cycle. It is propagated by an elderly education guru by the name of Lee Canter. We had to watch a million videos of Mr. Canter – he’s an awful public speaker and definitely does the “T-Rex” presenting pitfall (keeping his elbows at his side while vigorously moving his forearms) while presenting. But his methods are sounds, and I’ve found them incredibly helpful in my practice.
It works like this: first, give incredibly explicit directions. They may be in 9th grade, but kids have no idea what to do unless you explain it to them explicitly and clearly and model exactly how it should be done. I thought this was incredibly stupid at first (who doesn’t know how to work quietly and independently?) but it really is true – no one knows what to do unless someone teaches it to him or her, and that includes procedures and directions.
Next, focus on the positive and do something called Behavior Narration – that means, within two to three seconds of giving out an expectation or directions, you narrate what the kids are doing. An example would be that if you explicitly direct kids to get out of their desks and do a headstand against the back wall of the classroom for six minutes, three seconds after you give that direction you would say things like “Melissa is getting out of her seat and is going to do a headstand; Javier is at the back wall ready to do a headstand; Junior has started his headstand and will keep doing this for six minutes” etc.
It sounds corny and hilarious and it is. My CMA (that’s my mentor at Institute) thinks I’m good at it and it’s effective because I think it’s so funny. So I behavior narrate my ass off and have the best time, and here’s the crazy thing: it works! If one student is misbehaving (and trust me, you always have a kid who commits those irksome minor misbehaviors nonstop), behavior narrate all of the positive things the kids around him or her are doing, and eventually he’ll get the social cue and start doing it, too. Peer pressure works wonders.
But what if he or she doesn’t get it the first time around? Well, the third step of the Behavior Management Cycle is my least favorite: giving consequences. No one likes to be a “bad cop”; we all want our kids or coworkers or colleagues or employees to like us. But sometimes, you need to let them know they are out of line and need to step up their game, behavior-wise. An example:
“Stewie [I would laugh so hard if I ever teach a kid named Stewie], the expectation is that you are doing a headstand at the back wall of the classroom for six minutes. You have chosen to not follow the expectation, and this is your first warning, and it has been noted. Please get to the back wall and do a headstand for six minutes with the rest of the class.” (Of course I would do this in my best teacher voice – calm, confident, assertive, and leaving no doubt as to who is in charge of this classroom).
Giving consequences sucks; you never want to take away students’ privileges. In the case of Agua Fria J4, that would be chances to win a bathroom pass which we call StarBucks! (We took our SuperStars theme to the logical extreme – and beyond). However, sometimes you need to just remind them what the expectation is, and that they need to be following it. It totally makes class run that much smoother and decreases the chances that the misbehavior will happen again.
So that’s the formal way; I have, and I think all teachers do have, informal ways of keeping the kids in line. If the back right corner is chatting, go stand in the back right corner and conduct the lesson from there. Move around seats to ensure an optimal seating chart that minimizes misbehaviors. Put your hand on a student’s desk if he or she isn’t working – chances are he or she will snatch up that pencil and start writing so fast you won’t even get to behavior narration (which would be sad – I love to behavior narrate).
The best, however, and my favorite, is the Teacher Stare (hence the Gaga allusion at the title of this post). It’s cold, it’s piercing, it’s effective – and I’ve mastered it. If two kids are talking, just cock your head in their direction, purse your lips, fold your arms, and squint your eyes ever so slightly – their heads will be down and pencils will be moving so fast you have no idea. It’s actually an excellent power trip.
So that’s how I keep my class in line and avoid my worst nightmare – a class so out-of-control that they run circles around me and tie me to my chair with duct tape and pummel erasers at my forehead.
And that’s also how I put my management degree to good use.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Monday, July 12, 2010
Investing and Paying Dividends, pt. 1
At Kenan-Flagler Business School at UNC, whenever people talked about investing, I tuned out because that has to do with finance I think and I just don't get finance and I was going to be a teacher anyway and coasting through all my classes, so I thought whatever, Professor Blocher, I don't care and I'm not going to listen to you.
At Agua Fria High School at the TFA Phoenix Institute, it means getting students, parents, and teachers involved and engaged in lessons to the point where they self-motivate. It's an intriguing concept, motivation in - what lights that internal drive in a student? How can you foster that? How can you make a kid WANT to learn - to move from the "I CAN do it" (which is tough enough for some kids to begin with) to the "I WANT to do it". The second one was how I was in school, and how most of y'all probably were too, so I never really had thought about it before.
But getting kids to want to learn is tough.
There are all kinds of strategies - class themes to pique students' interest (ours is SuperStars - more on that to come), continued communication about student progress, references to students' dreams, aspirations, and their "Big Goals", building informal relationships - all of these are ways to foster that "I WANT".
My favorite, however, is positive reinforcement. These kids need to know that they are indeed capable of succeeding, that it will take a lot of work, and they we, as TFA teachers, are here to guide, facilitate, and help them along the way. The best way, I have found, of doing this is to repeatedly, constantly, and consistently praise students for what they do well. Focus on the positive, not on the negative. In TFA terms, the "pluses" and not the "deltas".
If Joe is misbehaving, mention all of the positive behaviors you see from students around Joey, and he'll come around.
If Jared is struggling in his writing, make sure you make a big deal when he does well, and he'll come around.
If Junior is not participating, make sure you praise him when he does and thank him for volunteering, and he'll come around. You'll see his hand more than anyone else's, as a matter of fact, by the end of the week.
Tell your kids they're SuperStars. Chart their progress on a "StarChart" in the room to let them know how well they're doing. Give them constant and unsolicited praise - it works.
That's kind of the set-up to the Investment process - it's become a big deal in my daily routine at Institute. However, I'm not the only one Investing - TFA staff invests in us daily just as much as we invest in our students.
And more to come about this later; I'm exhausted and really need to go to bed.
good night from the grand canyon state,
pb
At Agua Fria High School at the TFA Phoenix Institute, it means getting students, parents, and teachers involved and engaged in lessons to the point where they self-motivate. It's an intriguing concept, motivation in - what lights that internal drive in a student? How can you foster that? How can you make a kid WANT to learn - to move from the "I CAN do it" (which is tough enough for some kids to begin with) to the "I WANT to do it". The second one was how I was in school, and how most of y'all probably were too, so I never really had thought about it before.
But getting kids to want to learn is tough.
There are all kinds of strategies - class themes to pique students' interest (ours is SuperStars - more on that to come), continued communication about student progress, references to students' dreams, aspirations, and their "Big Goals", building informal relationships - all of these are ways to foster that "I WANT".
My favorite, however, is positive reinforcement. These kids need to know that they are indeed capable of succeeding, that it will take a lot of work, and they we, as TFA teachers, are here to guide, facilitate, and help them along the way. The best way, I have found, of doing this is to repeatedly, constantly, and consistently praise students for what they do well. Focus on the positive, not on the negative. In TFA terms, the "pluses" and not the "deltas".
If Joe is misbehaving, mention all of the positive behaviors you see from students around Joey, and he'll come around.
If Jared is struggling in his writing, make sure you make a big deal when he does well, and he'll come around.
If Junior is not participating, make sure you praise him when he does and thank him for volunteering, and he'll come around. You'll see his hand more than anyone else's, as a matter of fact, by the end of the week.
Tell your kids they're SuperStars. Chart their progress on a "StarChart" in the room to let them know how well they're doing. Give them constant and unsolicited praise - it works.
That's kind of the set-up to the Investment process - it's become a big deal in my daily routine at Institute. However, I'm not the only one Investing - TFA staff invests in us daily just as much as we invest in our students.
And more to come about this later; I'm exhausted and really need to go to bed.
good night from the grand canyon state,
pb
The Parent Trap Remix
So a few weeks ago, I wrote about how nervous I was the first time I chatted with parents about their students' progress.
One student's Mom and I had a great chat about why her daughter needed to be in school and how education is very important. I left the conversation impressed about the parent's positive involvement in her student's education and expecting great things for the next week.
Well I certainly need to follow up on this one.
The next day, the student came to class and was quiet as ever. I made a point to do some more one-on-one instruction with her, especially on her writing skills, which, while technically correct in terms of conventions and content, were totally lacking in voice or fluency - it was as if a robot had answered the writing prompt. I thought we came to an understanding about why more advanced writing was important, and why attendance in school is important as well.
We gave her a progress report and sent her home for the afternoon expecting to see her tomorrow.
Well, we didn't see her the next day. So my Collaborative (aka Kristy, the other half of my Agua Fria personality) called Mom to see what was up, and tell her that if the student (I'm hiding all names to protect the innocent/guilty/students/don't wanna get sued) missed one more day of the program, she would not receive credit for it. On top of this, our records indicated that this particular student needed the class to be promoted to 9th Grade - in other words, this is a very high-stakes class for her.
The Mom went ballistic, saying the student didn't need to come to the class, she wasn't being challenged (this made me exceptionally mad - I certainly had challenged her the day before in regards to her writing skills), she was an Honor Roll student (no comment on this, but the travesty of low expectations is definitely one of the major causes of the achievement gap), and that she would have words with the Principal, the School Board, the Department of Education, the Governor, various lawyers, and God knows who else.
So Kristy and my CMA Nikki (basically my mentor at Agua Fria) ran down (as fast as they could - Nikki's pregnant) to the Principal's office, but Mom was already on the phone ranting to the Principal, with, yes, various lawyers on the line.
Whoa. Talk about involved parents.
Turns out the student didn't need the class for promotion and the mother read the form wrong. Since, in the East Valley, school systems are separated by Elementary and High School Districts, and the two don't talk to one another, no one had checked to see if this student needed the class or not for promotion. Bureaucracy steps in the way of student achievement once again.
So Mom withdrew the student and that was the end of that. It's so frustrating, though, to work so hard on something, think you have come to an understanding with a person, and then realize you're on totally opposite pages, in totally opposite universes. So I guess my first foray into the field of parent communication did not exactly go as well as it seemed at first; however, there are definitely lessons to be learned from this. In my interview for my permanent school placement site in the fall, my new Principal asked if I had ever experience difficulties with a parent, or if not, how I would respond or react in that situation.
Now I have something to tell him.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
One student's Mom and I had a great chat about why her daughter needed to be in school and how education is very important. I left the conversation impressed about the parent's positive involvement in her student's education and expecting great things for the next week.
Well I certainly need to follow up on this one.
The next day, the student came to class and was quiet as ever. I made a point to do some more one-on-one instruction with her, especially on her writing skills, which, while technically correct in terms of conventions and content, were totally lacking in voice or fluency - it was as if a robot had answered the writing prompt. I thought we came to an understanding about why more advanced writing was important, and why attendance in school is important as well.
We gave her a progress report and sent her home for the afternoon expecting to see her tomorrow.
Well, we didn't see her the next day. So my Collaborative (aka Kristy, the other half of my Agua Fria personality) called Mom to see what was up, and tell her that if the student (I'm hiding all names to protect the innocent/guilty/students/don't wanna get sued) missed one more day of the program, she would not receive credit for it. On top of this, our records indicated that this particular student needed the class to be promoted to 9th Grade - in other words, this is a very high-stakes class for her.
The Mom went ballistic, saying the student didn't need to come to the class, she wasn't being challenged (this made me exceptionally mad - I certainly had challenged her the day before in regards to her writing skills), she was an Honor Roll student (no comment on this, but the travesty of low expectations is definitely one of the major causes of the achievement gap), and that she would have words with the Principal, the School Board, the Department of Education, the Governor, various lawyers, and God knows who else.
So Kristy and my CMA Nikki (basically my mentor at Agua Fria) ran down (as fast as they could - Nikki's pregnant) to the Principal's office, but Mom was already on the phone ranting to the Principal, with, yes, various lawyers on the line.
Whoa. Talk about involved parents.
Turns out the student didn't need the class for promotion and the mother read the form wrong. Since, in the East Valley, school systems are separated by Elementary and High School Districts, and the two don't talk to one another, no one had checked to see if this student needed the class or not for promotion. Bureaucracy steps in the way of student achievement once again.
So Mom withdrew the student and that was the end of that. It's so frustrating, though, to work so hard on something, think you have come to an understanding with a person, and then realize you're on totally opposite pages, in totally opposite universes. So I guess my first foray into the field of parent communication did not exactly go as well as it seemed at first; however, there are definitely lessons to be learned from this. In my interview for my permanent school placement site in the fall, my new Principal asked if I had ever experience difficulties with a parent, or if not, how I would respond or react in that situation.
Now I have something to tell him.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Positive Press
It just so happens that TFA has been getting a ton of (deserved) positive press lately. Two of the most noted papers in the country included positive articles about TFA in the past two days:
The New York Times
"A Chosen Few Are Teaching for America"
The Wall Street Journal
"What They're Doing After Harvard"
I especially like the first one because of the shoutout to Carolina - TFA is now the #1 employer at UNC! How awesome is that? Since I worked on the recruitment side last year it's great to see how our team's efforts have paid off and are being recognized.
I don't know why the barrage of positive press came at one time; maybe a concerted effort on the national front? But it certainly came at the right time; Institute is wrapping up and all of the encouragement certainly helps me stay focused!
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
The New York Times
"A Chosen Few Are Teaching for America"
The Wall Street Journal
"What They're Doing After Harvard"
I especially like the first one because of the shoutout to Carolina - TFA is now the #1 employer at UNC! How awesome is that? Since I worked on the recruitment side last year it's great to see how our team's efforts have paid off and are being recognized.
I don't know why the barrage of positive press came at one time; maybe a concerted effort on the national front? But it certainly came at the right time; Institute is wrapping up and all of the encouragement certainly helps me stay focused!
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Great News for Maryland
Greetings readers! Big news from my old home this past week - Maryland's public schools are ranked 1st in the country (again!) by Newsweek AND Education Week.
Arizona's are ranked 46th.
I have a lot of work to do.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Arizona's are ranked 46th.
I have a lot of work to do.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Mr. Boyle and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
"Not every day can be a gem," is what I remember one of my friends sagely remarking after a less-than-stellar night out at Ocean City for senior week way back in '06. I've taken that to heart over the past few years, and I've realized that even my bad days aren't really that bad, and I blow them out of proportion.
So even if last Monday wasn't actually a bad day by other people's standards, it was certainly for me.
I mean, Mondays suck anyway. That's always been the case. No one likes them, they're awful, they should be outlawed. End of story. And I've never believed this more than now, when my alarm clock starts its wretched ringing at 5:38 AM.
So the day, being a Monday, started off on a bad foot anyways.
Frazzled, on account of having a severe case of the Mondays, I ended up barely making the bus on time (thus sparing myself the $70 cab fare to Agua Fria - and yes, that's how far it is from Tempe), but in the process managed to lose my keys.
Maybe it was the coffee I guzzled on the way out to Avondale, or maybe it was my case of the Mondays sneaking up on my again, or maybe it was the fact that I was already over-stressed at this point, but I FREAKED out.
I couldn't concentrate. I couldn't focus on my lesson. And it showed. I switched from teaching reading to writing last Monday, and writing is TOUGH to teach. Now, I always thought that reading and writing go hand-in-hand. Like Starsky and Hutch or Donny and Marie or Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. But to my kids, they don't. Writing involves the creative thinking skills that just aren't stressed in underprivileged schools, and my kids really didn't enjoy writing.
So, at first, I didn't enjoy teaching it, and my lesson sort of flopped. (There will be a lot more to come about my struggles with the writing objectives, but it gets a lot better!)
I was so excited for the lesson to be over, and it showed. My thoughts were scattered, I couldn't answer basic questions, my kids were acting up a bit because they were confused, it just wasn't going well.
But then I decided, whoa, Peter, watch out. I had a TON to do that night; I couldn't let all of this get to me. 2 lesson plans AND Arizona Defensive Driving School lay in front of me, although none of those would be possible without my keys.
First thing's first: I wanted to avoid another encounter with Mr. Teacher-Cop at all costs, so I called the Yarnell Justice Court (oh, it's very real) and spoke to my new best friend (aka the clerk there) and we bonded over my famous name and OF COURSE she could grant me an extension on my traffic school completion and didn't I just have the most charming accent? (I throw in a lot of "y'all"s when I speak with older women, and I charm the pants of them)
Second: keys. Deep breaths. Where are they? Not in my lunch box. Yes, teachers carry around lunch boxes. Not in my classroom, or in my training rooms. Think. The bus? In reality, I was pretty sure they were on the bus all day, but I just couldn't help thinking of all the million places where they MIGHT (but in reality definitely WOULDN'T be - like a bar in Scottsdale or the bottom of a well or they were swept away in a sandstorm, etc.) be.
4:10 rolls around, and I run to the bus. Of course, there they were, sitting exactly where I stupidly left them. Deep breaths.
I focus during the bus ride on starting my lesson plans that are due that night, and then immediately start traffic school when I get back to ASU.
Arizona Defensive Driving School is all the worst parts of drivers' ed without an amusing alcoholic for an instructor to make things go by a little better. Literally, the first question on the test was:
1. What state's laws were discussed in this chapter?
A. Texas
B. Nevada
C. Arizona (DING DING DING - correct answer)
And there was a chapter entitled "Murder and Suicide on the Freeway" which I thought would be an entertaining true crime read in the vein of The Monster of Florence, but was just all about drunk driving. Bor-ing. Although I will never ever do that because I don't want crazy old Joe Arpaio to send me to Tent City, Arizona's prison for driving deadbeats located in the middle of the desert, actually quite conveniently close to Agua Fria.
I passed DDS by taking copious notes.*
*I actually passed DDS by copying-and-pasting and then waiting for the 4 hour and 30 minute clock to run down.
I used this time to lesson plan, which was actually a relaxing respite from DDS, if that could even be possible. AND I even got to go to McDonald's with my friend Amy and get a snack size McFlurry from the Dollar Menu, which made everything better.
11 PM rolled around, and I was done. My keys had been found, my driving school was completed (and I got a nifty certificate to boot), and yes, I had to teaching writing the next day, and yes, it was tough, but I could start over.
Tuesday was a new day.
Not every day is a gem, but if I take things one step at a time, and remember to breathe, things usually work out.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
So even if last Monday wasn't actually a bad day by other people's standards, it was certainly for me.
I mean, Mondays suck anyway. That's always been the case. No one likes them, they're awful, they should be outlawed. End of story. And I've never believed this more than now, when my alarm clock starts its wretched ringing at 5:38 AM.
So the day, being a Monday, started off on a bad foot anyways.
Frazzled, on account of having a severe case of the Mondays, I ended up barely making the bus on time (thus sparing myself the $70 cab fare to Agua Fria - and yes, that's how far it is from Tempe), but in the process managed to lose my keys.
Maybe it was the coffee I guzzled on the way out to Avondale, or maybe it was my case of the Mondays sneaking up on my again, or maybe it was the fact that I was already over-stressed at this point, but I FREAKED out.
I couldn't concentrate. I couldn't focus on my lesson. And it showed. I switched from teaching reading to writing last Monday, and writing is TOUGH to teach. Now, I always thought that reading and writing go hand-in-hand. Like Starsky and Hutch or Donny and Marie or Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld. But to my kids, they don't. Writing involves the creative thinking skills that just aren't stressed in underprivileged schools, and my kids really didn't enjoy writing.
So, at first, I didn't enjoy teaching it, and my lesson sort of flopped. (There will be a lot more to come about my struggles with the writing objectives, but it gets a lot better!)
I was so excited for the lesson to be over, and it showed. My thoughts were scattered, I couldn't answer basic questions, my kids were acting up a bit because they were confused, it just wasn't going well.
But then I decided, whoa, Peter, watch out. I had a TON to do that night; I couldn't let all of this get to me. 2 lesson plans AND Arizona Defensive Driving School lay in front of me, although none of those would be possible without my keys.
First thing's first: I wanted to avoid another encounter with Mr. Teacher-Cop at all costs, so I called the Yarnell Justice Court (oh, it's very real) and spoke to my new best friend (aka the clerk there) and we bonded over my famous name and OF COURSE she could grant me an extension on my traffic school completion and didn't I just have the most charming accent? (I throw in a lot of "y'all"s when I speak with older women, and I charm the pants of them)
Second: keys. Deep breaths. Where are they? Not in my lunch box. Yes, teachers carry around lunch boxes. Not in my classroom, or in my training rooms. Think. The bus? In reality, I was pretty sure they were on the bus all day, but I just couldn't help thinking of all the million places where they MIGHT (but in reality definitely WOULDN'T be - like a bar in Scottsdale or the bottom of a well or they were swept away in a sandstorm, etc.) be.
4:10 rolls around, and I run to the bus. Of course, there they were, sitting exactly where I stupidly left them. Deep breaths.
I focus during the bus ride on starting my lesson plans that are due that night, and then immediately start traffic school when I get back to ASU.
Arizona Defensive Driving School is all the worst parts of drivers' ed without an amusing alcoholic for an instructor to make things go by a little better. Literally, the first question on the test was:
1. What state's laws were discussed in this chapter?
A. Texas
B. Nevada
C. Arizona (DING DING DING - correct answer)
And there was a chapter entitled "Murder and Suicide on the Freeway" which I thought would be an entertaining true crime read in the vein of The Monster of Florence, but was just all about drunk driving. Bor-ing. Although I will never ever do that because I don't want crazy old Joe Arpaio to send me to Tent City, Arizona's prison for driving deadbeats located in the middle of the desert, actually quite conveniently close to Agua Fria.
I passed DDS by taking copious notes.*
*I actually passed DDS by copying-and-pasting and then waiting for the 4 hour and 30 minute clock to run down.
I used this time to lesson plan, which was actually a relaxing respite from DDS, if that could even be possible. AND I even got to go to McDonald's with my friend Amy and get a snack size McFlurry from the Dollar Menu, which made everything better.
11 PM rolled around, and I was done. My keys had been found, my driving school was completed (and I got a nifty certificate to boot), and yes, I had to teaching writing the next day, and yes, it was tough, but I could start over.
Tuesday was a new day.
Not every day is a gem, but if I take things one step at a time, and remember to breathe, things usually work out.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Sunday, July 4, 2010
“Run With the Flow of Traffic!”
The last time I went to Vegas was the last night of my epic cross-country roadtrip. We stayed at the awesomely kitschy Excalibur, dined at the restaurants at the Venetian, and then I treated everyone to table service at the outdoor nightclub Pure at Caesar’s Palace (joke’s on me – I thought I was being paid for these tough weeks of teacher boot camp. But I’m not – womp, womp). The night ended filled with drama and misery, so when I drove from Vegas to Phoenix, I certainly left Sin City with bittersweet memories.
And then I got my infamous speeding ticket in Yarnell, Arizona – really wasn’t a good 24 hours for me.
So now I’m headed back to Vegas with some of my TFAvorites for the 4th of July weekend, and we headed back over the same roads that I took to come to Phoenix about a month ago, passing by mile marker 191 (I think that’s what it was) where I had my encounter with Mr. Teacher-Cop.
But maybe the ride to Vegas can never be perfect, because we are stuck in hours of traffic on the Arizona side of the Hoover Dam. An aside: the Hoover Dam is amazing. It’s massive, a real engineering masterpiece, and the waters of Lake Mead behind it are so perfectly blue you think you’re upside down and staring into the sky as you peer down into the depths of the canyon gorged millions of years ago by the mighty Colorado River. I’m kind of glad, actually, that the traffic is so bad, because we’ve got a great look at the Dam and I got to take a picture of it this time, which I didn’t last time.
The traffic also made the “Be Prepared to Stop” sign along US 93 seem somewhat ironic; we had been stopped for about fifty minutes before that point, so that gave us a all a big laugh.
But the downside of this traffic is that a) we’ll get to Vegas WAY behind schedule and b) if the car is stalled because of the traffic in 104 degree weather (it’s kind of a chilly day here), the air conditioning fails. I’ve got this computer on my lap, and I’m wearing a swimsuit, and there is a nice laptop-sized sweat stain on my thighs. It’s that hot.
peace and love from lake mead,
pb
And then I got my infamous speeding ticket in Yarnell, Arizona – really wasn’t a good 24 hours for me.
So now I’m headed back to Vegas with some of my TFAvorites for the 4th of July weekend, and we headed back over the same roads that I took to come to Phoenix about a month ago, passing by mile marker 191 (I think that’s what it was) where I had my encounter with Mr. Teacher-Cop.
But maybe the ride to Vegas can never be perfect, because we are stuck in hours of traffic on the Arizona side of the Hoover Dam. An aside: the Hoover Dam is amazing. It’s massive, a real engineering masterpiece, and the waters of Lake Mead behind it are so perfectly blue you think you’re upside down and staring into the sky as you peer down into the depths of the canyon gorged millions of years ago by the mighty Colorado River. I’m kind of glad, actually, that the traffic is so bad, because we’ve got a great look at the Dam and I got to take a picture of it this time, which I didn’t last time.
The traffic also made the “Be Prepared to Stop” sign along US 93 seem somewhat ironic; we had been stopped for about fifty minutes before that point, so that gave us a all a big laugh.
But the downside of this traffic is that a) we’ll get to Vegas WAY behind schedule and b) if the car is stalled because of the traffic in 104 degree weather (it’s kind of a chilly day here), the air conditioning fails. I’ve got this computer on my lap, and I’m wearing a swimsuit, and there is a nice laptop-sized sweat stain on my thighs. It’s that hot.
peace and love from lake mead,
pb
An Ode to Mill Avenue
Befitting its status as the biggest school, and biggest party school, in the country, ASU naturally has an awesome party scene. The epicenter of it all, where it all goes down, is Mill Avenue, a king-sized version of Franklin Street in downtown Tempe. Mill is crowded, jam-packed even during the summer; I can only imagine how it is during the school year.
Mill Avenue is where ASU parades its awesomeness. Hot girls in bump-its with orange tans, gigantic guys wearing Ed Hardy without a hint of irony – Mill Avenue is kind of like the Jersey Shore.
The hotspots include Big Bang, a dueling piano bar where they took the whole Phoenix 2010 Corps on the Saturday before Institute started as a last hurrah before the intensity began. Dueling piano bars are my new favorite; after we went to one in Kansas City and met some fun Danes, I’ve been hooked. I mean, I think my job is tough, but workers at a dueling piano bar have to know every word to every song ever! Think of the pressure.
Fat Tuesday’s is a fun Mardi Gras-themed bar on Mill, the Cue Club has more pool tables and room to chill than any other bar I’ve been to. But, besides Big Bang, my all-time favorite bar on Mill is Vintage. Oh, Vintage. It’s a no-cover dance club with $1 PBR’s on Fridays; you can just imagine what goes down there. It’s like Players in Chapel Hill, but with a sketchier clientele, if that’s possible. It’s sweaty, it’s crowded, and it’s pretty dirty. But it’s the perfect place to rage and go wild after a tough week. I went three nights in a row at the end of Induction, and I didn’t think I could stand ever again after that.
Like everything, even Mill Ave has a worst thing I hate about it. The worst thing I hate about Mill is that each bar has bathroom attendants. I hate bathroom attendants. They make me feel so uncomfortable when they try to hand me paper towels or mints or mouthwash or whatever it is their hawking. And they demand tips and I never carry around cash, and tipping is awkward for me anyways because I can never figure out how much to give, so there’s that whole aspect of it too.
Not all of the best bars in Tempe are on Mill; my second favorite is called The Vine, and if you’ve been following me at all on Twitter (PeterCPBoyle – tweet me!) over the past few weeks, you know exactly how much time I spend there. It’s THE TFA bar – we go all the time. People go to lesson plan, people go to hang out, people go to just relax or rage on Friday nights after the weekend. One of my favorite parts of every week is heading to the Vine on Friday nights to see who’s around, share war stories from a week spent in the trenches fighting the education gap, and get a ton of dollar drinks. The amount of booze imbibed during the six week of Institute and Induction at the Vine would fill Lake Mead (which is to my right as I write this crossing over the Hoover Dam!) – although the Vine hasn’t realized this yet, and only has two bartenders available to serve all 500 of us at the Phoenix Institute.
Yesterday was the first Friday of July, and on the first Friday of each month, downtown Phoenix goes crazy with a street arts and booze festival called (creatively) First Fridays. But we all went to the Vine instead – we have two years to explore First Fridays, but the Vine will only be cool for the two weeks left of TFA training. And besides, it’s so convenient – it’s literally across Apache Street from our lovely dorms at ASU.
peace and love from the border of the grand canyon state and the silver state,
pb
Mill Avenue is where ASU parades its awesomeness. Hot girls in bump-its with orange tans, gigantic guys wearing Ed Hardy without a hint of irony – Mill Avenue is kind of like the Jersey Shore.
The hotspots include Big Bang, a dueling piano bar where they took the whole Phoenix 2010 Corps on the Saturday before Institute started as a last hurrah before the intensity began. Dueling piano bars are my new favorite; after we went to one in Kansas City and met some fun Danes, I’ve been hooked. I mean, I think my job is tough, but workers at a dueling piano bar have to know every word to every song ever! Think of the pressure.
Fat Tuesday’s is a fun Mardi Gras-themed bar on Mill, the Cue Club has more pool tables and room to chill than any other bar I’ve been to. But, besides Big Bang, my all-time favorite bar on Mill is Vintage. Oh, Vintage. It’s a no-cover dance club with $1 PBR’s on Fridays; you can just imagine what goes down there. It’s like Players in Chapel Hill, but with a sketchier clientele, if that’s possible. It’s sweaty, it’s crowded, and it’s pretty dirty. But it’s the perfect place to rage and go wild after a tough week. I went three nights in a row at the end of Induction, and I didn’t think I could stand ever again after that.
Like everything, even Mill Ave has a worst thing I hate about it. The worst thing I hate about Mill is that each bar has bathroom attendants. I hate bathroom attendants. They make me feel so uncomfortable when they try to hand me paper towels or mints or mouthwash or whatever it is their hawking. And they demand tips and I never carry around cash, and tipping is awkward for me anyways because I can never figure out how much to give, so there’s that whole aspect of it too.
Not all of the best bars in Tempe are on Mill; my second favorite is called The Vine, and if you’ve been following me at all on Twitter (PeterCPBoyle – tweet me!) over the past few weeks, you know exactly how much time I spend there. It’s THE TFA bar – we go all the time. People go to lesson plan, people go to hang out, people go to just relax or rage on Friday nights after the weekend. One of my favorite parts of every week is heading to the Vine on Friday nights to see who’s around, share war stories from a week spent in the trenches fighting the education gap, and get a ton of dollar drinks. The amount of booze imbibed during the six week of Institute and Induction at the Vine would fill Lake Mead (which is to my right as I write this crossing over the Hoover Dam!) – although the Vine hasn’t realized this yet, and only has two bartenders available to serve all 500 of us at the Phoenix Institute.
Yesterday was the first Friday of July, and on the first Friday of each month, downtown Phoenix goes crazy with a street arts and booze festival called (creatively) First Fridays. But we all went to the Vine instead – we have two years to explore First Fridays, but the Vine will only be cool for the two weeks left of TFA training. And besides, it’s so convenient – it’s literally across Apache Street from our lovely dorms at ASU.
peace and love from the border of the grand canyon state and the silver state,
pb
Diversions
It’s not all business all the time here, which is good. I go to the massive gym at ASU to get a release from the stress, and I get to go to the pool a lot to just take a break. Not only do I get to work on my pretty brown skin (which is still kind of pasty, since I spend most of my time inside the copy room or inside classroom J4 at Agua Fria.
But when I am at the pool, I’ve been reading an awesome true crime book called The Monster of Florence. It’s about Italy’s most notorious serial killer of the same name who terrorized the Tuscan countryside for a few decades towards the end of the last century. I know, I keep telling people what the book is about, and when I say serial killer, I get funny looks and sideways glances. The killer has never been found; Italy’s dysfunctional and corrupt judicial system has been accusing upstanding people for years of the murders based on crackpot conspiracy theories and personal vendettas while ignoring the basic facts and evidence of the case. The writers of the book, Mario Spezi and Douglas Preston, have been accused by a corrupt judge (the same one who cooked up the case against Amanda Knox) of complicity in the murders and weave their compelling first-person account of the vents involved into the chilling narrative relating the original evidence and reports of the crimes.
It’s a great story, a great way to escape from the challenges I face and I can’t help but to think, “Well, this is tough, but at least I haven’t been accused of the rape-murders of eighteen Italians back in the eighties.” And it’s always good to find another country that’s more messed up than ours is, as Italy is certainly portrayed in Il Mostro.
Speaking of diversions, I also got to revisit my childhood last weekend when a friend of mine and I left campus for a while to go see Toy Story 3. For many of us, the original Toy Story was a defining movie of our childhood. It was the first movie to bring the novelty of computer-assisted art to the big screen. Everyone saw it, everyone raved about it. Getting to see the culmination of the Toy Story saga (and in 3D too!) as I start my career as an educator was a fitting culmination to my own childhood; even though I’ve been out of the house for a few years, it was great to think back and reflect nonetheless.
And it’s always good to get a break from lesson planning and the copy room, too.
I hope everyone’s summer is going well, too!
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
But when I am at the pool, I’ve been reading an awesome true crime book called The Monster of Florence. It’s about Italy’s most notorious serial killer of the same name who terrorized the Tuscan countryside for a few decades towards the end of the last century. I know, I keep telling people what the book is about, and when I say serial killer, I get funny looks and sideways glances. The killer has never been found; Italy’s dysfunctional and corrupt judicial system has been accusing upstanding people for years of the murders based on crackpot conspiracy theories and personal vendettas while ignoring the basic facts and evidence of the case. The writers of the book, Mario Spezi and Douglas Preston, have been accused by a corrupt judge (the same one who cooked up the case against Amanda Knox) of complicity in the murders and weave their compelling first-person account of the vents involved into the chilling narrative relating the original evidence and reports of the crimes.
It’s a great story, a great way to escape from the challenges I face and I can’t help but to think, “Well, this is tough, but at least I haven’t been accused of the rape-murders of eighteen Italians back in the eighties.” And it’s always good to find another country that’s more messed up than ours is, as Italy is certainly portrayed in Il Mostro.
Speaking of diversions, I also got to revisit my childhood last weekend when a friend of mine and I left campus for a while to go see Toy Story 3. For many of us, the original Toy Story was a defining movie of our childhood. It was the first movie to bring the novelty of computer-assisted art to the big screen. Everyone saw it, everyone raved about it. Getting to see the culmination of the Toy Story saga (and in 3D too!) as I start my career as an educator was a fitting culmination to my own childhood; even though I’ve been out of the house for a few years, it was great to think back and reflect nonetheless.
And it’s always good to get a break from lesson planning and the copy room, too.
I hope everyone’s summer is going well, too!
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
“Teaching is Hard”
Back during Induction, which seems like several years ago but was really only 4 four weeks ago, everyone kept saying “Teaching is hard, teaching is hard, teaching is hard…” and I was like I get it, teaching is hard. But you know what, teaching is hard.
You’re acting all the time, it’s a constant presentation, you’re in the spotlight at all times. There are 13 people who are literally depending on you to change their lives. It’s a pressure cooker up there in front of the room, with staff members in the back observing.
Flexibility is a necessity. The projector breaks, you can’t find your assessments for the day, you didn’t make enough copies of the guided notes, you lost the rough draft of Junior’s essay, the air conditioning is broken.
The planning takes hours, maybe an hour per lesson plan, and then the revising and copying and printing takes even longer.
But it’s wonderful. The best part of my day is the hour when I’m up in the front of the classroom, writing notes on a transparency on the projector, asking for questions, checking for understanding, improving my practice. I love teaching. I love the look of “Aha!” when one of my kids “gets” it, or the pride on one of their faces if they got a 100 on their daily assessment.
I definitely chose the right career path.
peace and love from the grand canyon state (actually the part that’s right next to the Hoover Dam because I’m stuck in traffic o my way to Vegas for the 4th),
pb
You’re acting all the time, it’s a constant presentation, you’re in the spotlight at all times. There are 13 people who are literally depending on you to change their lives. It’s a pressure cooker up there in front of the room, with staff members in the back observing.
Flexibility is a necessity. The projector breaks, you can’t find your assessments for the day, you didn’t make enough copies of the guided notes, you lost the rough draft of Junior’s essay, the air conditioning is broken.
The planning takes hours, maybe an hour per lesson plan, and then the revising and copying and printing takes even longer.
But it’s wonderful. The best part of my day is the hour when I’m up in the front of the classroom, writing notes on a transparency on the projector, asking for questions, checking for understanding, improving my practice. I love teaching. I love the look of “Aha!” when one of my kids “gets” it, or the pride on one of their faces if they got a 100 on their daily assessment.
I definitely chose the right career path.
peace and love from the grand canyon state (actually the part that’s right next to the Hoover Dam because I’m stuck in traffic o my way to Vegas for the 4th),
pb
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Sun Devils are better than Blue Devils
I started my first grad school class at Arizona State University on May 5. I graduated from the University of North Carolina on May 9. This doesn’t really add up for me, either.
But yes, now I am a member of the Arizona State University Masters of Education Class of 2012. The work is supposed to be kind of a joke, but if I’m gonna be 23 and have worked as a teacher for two years AND have a Master’s, mostly paid for on TFA’s dime, I’ll take it. And the state requires it to be a certified teacher, so that’s a pretty compelling reason, too.
I’ll be taking my classes at ASU’s downtown Phoenix campus, which is conveniently across the street from my swanky new apartment. But this summer I’m staying at the main campus in Tempe, in ASU’s dorms.
I haven’t lived in a dorm since sophomore year and I haven’t wanted to. If someone asked me last year what I would be doing this summer, I sure as hell wouldn’t have said that I would be living in a dorm in Tempe, Arizona.
As far as dorms go, Hassayampa is pretty nice; however, I think it was designed by a chronic drunk. Hallways abruptly end, as do stairways and elevators, which also are in the habit of getting stuck periodically. Doors lock and you can’t get back in them; the place is kind of like a fortress. To get into my room, I have to unlock six (SIX!) different doors. This cannot be safe in case of a fire.
Like I said, the building must have been designed by someone with substance abuse issues: two bedrooms share a bathroom, and that’s fine, except for that the bathroom locks from the inside and sometimes our suitemates forget to unlock our door (and sometimes we forget to unlock their door). So that periodically sucks.
I have a friend in the Corps who interned for the architectural firm that designed the building, and warned us before we moved in that it was an awful building. I should have believed him.
Also, ASU is on this “green” kick. This means that the water in the bathrooms is “low flow” in order to use less of it, and we and our suitemates have to share one air conditioning unit, which must be set at the same temperature for both rooms, and as someone who prefers to make my room a little icebox oasis in the Arizona desert, the room is almost invariably too hot.
Arizona is the opposite of Denmark; but they do have one thing in common: no trashcans. In their initiatives to “green” their respective domains, they place recycling bins everywhere. However, the remains of a Subway sandwich, for example, cannot be recycled, and thus I’m left with a smelly sandwich in my grad student bag.
Those are the worst things I hate about ASU and its campus, but there are a million things I love. One is the Tempe bar scene, and more on that to come, but one is also definitely ASU’s gym. I’ve never seen a larger fitness facility – it’s unreal. It has three pools, three massive weight rooms (one of which is outside – explain how that works), and about 75 cardio machines, maybe even more.
Of course all of this is fitting for being the largest school in the country, I mean ASU has to accommodate at least some of its 60,000 students, but I was impressed nonetheless.
The physical campus itself is also very pretty: manicured patches of desert dotted by saguaro and prickly pears dot the landscape. The buildings are also typical Arizona faux-adobe and the temperatures of icicles, and they have a Starbucks, a Burger King, AND a Taco Bell in their Union.
I miss Chapel Hill dearly; I miss the azaleas by South Building and the Old Well, and I miss laying out on the Quad, and I miss Franklin Street and the Carolina blue seats of the Dean Dome. I miss trips to Southpoint and I miss the Top O blueberry beer and blue cups at He’s Not.
But the transition was a lot easier to move out here to have such a great college and college town to come to.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
But yes, now I am a member of the Arizona State University Masters of Education Class of 2012. The work is supposed to be kind of a joke, but if I’m gonna be 23 and have worked as a teacher for two years AND have a Master’s, mostly paid for on TFA’s dime, I’ll take it. And the state requires it to be a certified teacher, so that’s a pretty compelling reason, too.
I’ll be taking my classes at ASU’s downtown Phoenix campus, which is conveniently across the street from my swanky new apartment. But this summer I’m staying at the main campus in Tempe, in ASU’s dorms.
I haven’t lived in a dorm since sophomore year and I haven’t wanted to. If someone asked me last year what I would be doing this summer, I sure as hell wouldn’t have said that I would be living in a dorm in Tempe, Arizona.
As far as dorms go, Hassayampa is pretty nice; however, I think it was designed by a chronic drunk. Hallways abruptly end, as do stairways and elevators, which also are in the habit of getting stuck periodically. Doors lock and you can’t get back in them; the place is kind of like a fortress. To get into my room, I have to unlock six (SIX!) different doors. This cannot be safe in case of a fire.
Like I said, the building must have been designed by someone with substance abuse issues: two bedrooms share a bathroom, and that’s fine, except for that the bathroom locks from the inside and sometimes our suitemates forget to unlock our door (and sometimes we forget to unlock their door). So that periodically sucks.
I have a friend in the Corps who interned for the architectural firm that designed the building, and warned us before we moved in that it was an awful building. I should have believed him.
Also, ASU is on this “green” kick. This means that the water in the bathrooms is “low flow” in order to use less of it, and we and our suitemates have to share one air conditioning unit, which must be set at the same temperature for both rooms, and as someone who prefers to make my room a little icebox oasis in the Arizona desert, the room is almost invariably too hot.
Arizona is the opposite of Denmark; but they do have one thing in common: no trashcans. In their initiatives to “green” their respective domains, they place recycling bins everywhere. However, the remains of a Subway sandwich, for example, cannot be recycled, and thus I’m left with a smelly sandwich in my grad student bag.
Those are the worst things I hate about ASU and its campus, but there are a million things I love. One is the Tempe bar scene, and more on that to come, but one is also definitely ASU’s gym. I’ve never seen a larger fitness facility – it’s unreal. It has three pools, three massive weight rooms (one of which is outside – explain how that works), and about 75 cardio machines, maybe even more.
Of course all of this is fitting for being the largest school in the country, I mean ASU has to accommodate at least some of its 60,000 students, but I was impressed nonetheless.
The physical campus itself is also very pretty: manicured patches of desert dotted by saguaro and prickly pears dot the landscape. The buildings are also typical Arizona faux-adobe and the temperatures of icicles, and they have a Starbucks, a Burger King, AND a Taco Bell in their Union.
I miss Chapel Hill dearly; I miss the azaleas by South Building and the Old Well, and I miss laying out on the Quad, and I miss Franklin Street and the Carolina blue seats of the Dean Dome. I miss trips to Southpoint and I miss the Top O blueberry beer and blue cups at He’s Not.
But the transition was a lot easier to move out here to have such a great college and college town to come to.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
The ACTUAL Worst Thing I Hate About TFA
TFA gives us $75 of printing and copying money for the five weeks of Institute. This is good, because English teachers print literally hundreds of pages of passages, assessments, readings, and note pages every week.
However, to use this copy money, I have to hike about half a mile across the ASU campus to the Copy Room. It’s under the business school at the Tempe campus, and it has about 100 computers, 15 copy machines, and a few printers and scanners.
This room is the worst thing I hate about TFA.
It has one rule: “No crying in the Copy Room.” That’s good, because the copy room is about as high-stress as TFA gets. People frantically run around from computer to printer to copier with no smiles on their faces and lots of coffee.
And, on top of this pressure cooker dungeon atmosphere, the technological logistics of the place are mind-boggling. Only one of the three scanners works, the printing and copying systems are not on the same contract and thus not on the same networks, which makes it hard to work with both of them, and for some reason my conference card (my ASU ID) only works on a few printers.
Oh, and on top of this, there is one magical mystery printer that prints 8 times as much as you want, and I can never remember which one that is.
It is my stressful and awful personal hell and I have already run out of printing money.
I try to avoid this place at all, but it’s sort of a requirement to, you know, have papers for my students and such.
I hate it.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
However, to use this copy money, I have to hike about half a mile across the ASU campus to the Copy Room. It’s under the business school at the Tempe campus, and it has about 100 computers, 15 copy machines, and a few printers and scanners.
This room is the worst thing I hate about TFA.
It has one rule: “No crying in the Copy Room.” That’s good, because the copy room is about as high-stress as TFA gets. People frantically run around from computer to printer to copier with no smiles on their faces and lots of coffee.
And, on top of this pressure cooker dungeon atmosphere, the technological logistics of the place are mind-boggling. Only one of the three scanners works, the printing and copying systems are not on the same contract and thus not on the same networks, which makes it hard to work with both of them, and for some reason my conference card (my ASU ID) only works on a few printers.
Oh, and on top of this, there is one magical mystery printer that prints 8 times as much as you want, and I can never remember which one that is.
It is my stressful and awful personal hell and I have already run out of printing money.
I try to avoid this place at all, but it’s sort of a requirement to, you know, have papers for my students and such.
I hate it.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
Panera doesn’t exist here
Today I was driving up the road to Vegas for the 4th and I saw a very familiar billboard. Looking back at me was a delicious strawberry chicken salad, on a dark brown background. The font seemed similar too; but, instead of the familiar Panera Bread branding was PARADISE BREAD CAFÉ. What??
I immediately assumed that some major Chinese-style intellectual property theft was going on, so I turned to my trusty CrackBerry and decided to check the situation out.
Turns out that much like daylight savings time or a sane state legislature, Arizona doesn’t have Panera Bread, but its own version. It’s called Paradise Bread Company and it is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Panera. I haven’t been to one yet, but I will have to check it out.
I also was indeed wondering why I hadn’t seen any Paneras here yet; guess that mystery’s solved.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
I immediately assumed that some major Chinese-style intellectual property theft was going on, so I turned to my trusty CrackBerry and decided to check the situation out.
Turns out that much like daylight savings time or a sane state legislature, Arizona doesn’t have Panera Bread, but its own version. It’s called Paradise Bread Company and it is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Panera. I haven’t been to one yet, but I will have to check it out.
I also was indeed wondering why I hadn’t seen any Paneras here yet; guess that mystery’s solved.
peace and love from the grand canyon state,
pb
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