A few hours later and I'm much better...maybe it was all the lawn mowing that helped me have time to think and burn off my extra energy. I was encouraged...actually very encouraged by the fact that Secretary Duncan and Brad Judd started the call off on an encouraging note....they were pretty brief for opening comments. That really makes me think, in retrospect, that they came to listen.
I don't think we got there, but I think the intent was present. That's super encouraging to me because I wasn't sure what to think. So many of my teacher friends have done these kinds of chats before and they felt like the DOE answers were just long-winded recitations of what they already knew. Our conversation didn't start off that way.
Now after that it turned out pretty badly. I'm going to hope that if the phone technology had been working it might have been better. But I could only hear one of the others when they spoke...the rest of it was pretty garbled...I got about every third word. Thank goodness that Mary Tedrow's comments came through very clearly. How articulate she was...she was a great beacon for programs that understand teachers and make us stronger.
My partner, Heather Wolpert-Gawron, did an outstanding job of improv. She tried so hard to relay our message about college readiness, but the echo chamber drowned out her words. It was obvious that she knows how to think on her feet because she abandoned our plan and tried to engage. Read her description of what we wanted to convey over at her blog. I couldn't make out much of what the DOE's response was except that they agree.
Here's what I would have loved to have said....this idea of college readiness is so very frustrating to someone like me. For me, it's not about college readiness. Heck I teach 12 year olds. It's about igniting their curiosity again...like when they were little kids. It's about building up their intellectual muscles so they can hang in there. Have you ever been in front of middle schoolers who don't get it? Their first inclination is to give up or beg for you to tell them the right answer. So I work with them all year to believe in themselves....to continue to struggle until they come to understand what it is we're studying...using their own brains. They hate it to be sure. But they get better and better and better. Actually the more they struggle, the more they can take on the next time.
But that isn't in a BluePrint for college readiness. And it isn't on any state assessment tests that I've ever seen or heard of. And it isn't going to ever be on an assessment that anyone but a real teacher designs. Yet I think it is one, if not THE most important thing that I teach my 6th graders. If I can convince them they are smart, they have skills and they can learn anything if they try hard enough...they'll for sure make it to college or anyplace else they want to go.
Another thing I didn't say today....is that I want to find a way to get the teacher voice being the loudest one in the room. Right now I'm pretty sick and tired of having someone (and there are a lot of someones these days telling me what and how I should do more for my kids) explain how I need to improve. Now I wouldn't mind that so much if anyone ever bothered to show up in my room and watch me teach or if they ever talked to my students about my class. Shoot ask my kids.....my best comment this year from one of my baseball fanatic boys that hates school because he's going to be in the major leagues was this...."you make me try. I've never had to try at school. You make me sit up and pay attention. I've never done that for so long before. You treat me like I'm smart and I'm almost smart and will be very soon." Parents pretty much feel the same way...I go the extra mile emailing and staying in touch. I give kids the support they need to take care of business and work as a team with their parents. And then we get something like a push to do more because our kids aren't ready to go to college????? Shoot........whoever is saying that isn't watching the same classroom as I am.
If the people who crafted the assessment part of the BluePrint would only come around to the thousands of rooms across the country that are like mine (and I have no doubt that they far away exceed the number of floundering classrooms), you'd see wonderful things already happening. Why do we need a BluePrint to fix what isn't broken?????? Why do we need to have the state apply for federal $$$ to come and teach us what we already know?????? It will be counterproductive and unhelpful. It will be yet one more time where we are asked to sit through something that pushes us or trains us to do something inferior to what we've already mastered.
I wish I would have asked that question. How come you can figure out who does needs the help and who is doing fine without it??? My friend, Nancy Flanagan, said our phone call was a little like speed dating from Mad Men. Read her take...it's pretty funny and right on.
I learned so much from engaging in this process. I think I saw that DOE came to listen and if we'd had some technology that worked, this could have been a wonderful exchange. For now, I'm going back to my kids tomorrow with my head up. I'll tell them that I tried...didn't do much good, but I tried. I exercised my obligation as a citizen to participate and what happens from there is beyond my control. So let's get back to the Wump family of similar figures!!!!!
I'm glad to know that, with reflection, it was a more positive experience than you felt initially. Progress is progress, and if real listening was indeed happening, that does feel like progress to me. Also, as I've written elsewhere, it's hard to know everything they're thinking since they might have to be circumspect about any shifts in thinking you may have caused. And whatever else may or may not be true, they invited you to give it your best shot - and, if restricted (ironically) by technology, you did!
Posted by: Bivey | May 25, 2010 at 05:26 AM
Marsha - thoughtful and deeply reflective, as ever. If only they had the good sense to gather some of you together for a real conversation. They don't seem ready to really listen, but perhaps they're the wrong people to be talking to, anyhow. Their politics will change when the public will changes. Keep using your bully pulpits.
Posted by: John in NC | May 25, 2010 at 12:37 PM
Marsha - thoughtful and deeply reflective, as ever. If only they had the good sense to gather some of you together for a real conversation. They don't seem ready to really listen, but perhaps they're the wrong people to be talking to, anyhow. Their politics will change when the public will changes. Keep using your bully pulpits.
Posted by: John in NC | May 25, 2010 at 12:38 PM