My Squirrelly View of Education

Karen Jankowski’s April 3rd 2009 post Reaching for the Brass Ring…..of Independence, advances the proposition that it is time to end the war between the remediation and accommodation camps in special education and make Universal Design Principles ubiquitous in order to foster independence.

It is time to end the remediation vs. compensation battle and declare a truce. The emphasis on remediation at the expense of accommodation must stop. Instead, remediation

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MUST be COMBINED with compensation to accommodate for learning challenges if our students are to feel a sense of competence, mastery and independence.

This is what I have always believed and wanted to  practice in my classroom. Independence should be our ultimate goal. However, we will not be accomplish this unless education policymakers have to be brought into the fold. In the great debate over raising standards for all students, policy makers overlook the needs of our students.

In the push to turn the Michigan workforce from a blue collar industrial one to a high tech one, our legislators in their infinite wisdom forced a new state curriculum and high school exam upon us. Now In Michigan high schools we now have to teach a college prep curriculum to all students regardless of disability and/or career plans. This includes the requirement that all students (emphasis on the “all”) Algebra II for all students. The Michigan Merit Exam begins with all but the most impaired students taking the ACT, a college placement exam. Accommodations can be given only if the company that produces the ACT approves regardless of what a student’s IEP says.  To further muddy the waters, this test is what is used to determine AYP and accreditation. Pressure is now on districts to make sure that students receive the content needed to at least get an adequate score on this test.

While I applaud their intent to raise standards, I question their methods.

As Special Educators we are forced to accommodate and provide content at expensive of working on deficit areas. Yes, our goals are still suppose to reflect the deficit, but in reality there is no time to do both with the pressures of the state curriculum. Co-teaching has become the preferred way to deliver content. Few schools have spent the time or the PD to make co-teaching work. It has become the General Ed teachers grade the Gen Ed kids. The Special Ed teacher just grades the same assignments to a different standard. True collaboration doesn’t occur in this forced co-teaching environment.

As I see it, everyone in the process needs to, so Karen so eloquently states,

Understand that students learn differently, that a one-size-fits all approach does NOT work.

We need the time and the support of our administrators, legislators, and State Department to effectively apply Universal Design Principles to this curriculum. Co-teaching can be effective if all parties participate in developing appropriate classroom activities that ensure learning for all.

I implore our state Department of Education to poor money and time into making this curriculum work for our special education students, rather than spending time and money on the minutia of correctly completed paperwork. Please make this curriculum accessible enough so that our students just don’t give up and leave school.

For now, my colleagues and I will do what  we can to get our kids to graduation. We do need a paradigm shift but it needs to begin at the very top with our legistlature and the State Department of Education.

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A few of you have been following the Denny’s Grand Slam debacle at my school (see previous posts if you want the details). I kept searching for a way to make this a teachable moment.  Fortunately for me (but not for the school) the local newspaper published an article about what occurred.  The article itself was innocuous but the online comments……   Just  let me say that I was embarrassed for our community and our school. The impressions left by the commenters were by in large negative.  I’m not sure I would want my children to live near or attend school with these people.  Fortunately, I know that the people who commented are not typical of the community as a whole.  This is still a good place to raise kids.

At the end of that week, I printed out the article and the comments, giving a copy to each student. I asked them read and respond to the comments in a blog post.  The post was to focus on the impression that a reader was left with after reading the comments. They also had to examine the quality of the comments using our criteria for commenting on blogs and to discuss what effect anonymity has on the content of posts. (I gave them more details/directions in the assignment post. I’ve linked it here for your examination.)

This assignment caused a lot of discussion in class.  Initially, they wanted to respond to what was said, but as the hour progressed most students got the point. The assignment was really about how you present yourself online.  They came to realize that making hateful comments adds nothing to the discussion and ends up making the writer look bad.  They were able to see real life examples of how some people misuse technology and the harm this misuse causes.  I think they started to appreciate why I expect them to clearly identify and truthfully representing themselves online.

Not all of the students got their posts finished. Some are still working on them. Still, I invite you to read their responses. This trimester ends on March 6th, so all posts should be done by then. I get a new group of sophomores on March 9th and I plan to repeat this assignment for them.  I’ll keep you posted.

Today, Tuesday, February 3, 2009, the Denny’s restaurants in Michigan gave away free Grand Slam breakfasts from 6:00 am to 2:00 pm.  As soon as I heard about this promotion I felt sorry for the wait staff. I knew that mayhem would ensue. Little did I expect it to affect my classroom.

According to what my students told me, the local Denny’s had lines out the door at 6:00am. People were waiting and hour or more to be seated.   This “mob” included students from at least four area high schools.  (My high school had 97 students in line or eating after our school day began.)  As other kids already at school realized that their friends were at Denny’s, they skipped out the door and went to join them. Mr. B our vice principal paid Denny’s a visit during first hour and recorded the names of the guilty. Their punishment is still to be determined.

I can just imagine what that looked like. My vice principal is a tough and fair good guy, but he’s very short. I can see all of those kids towering over him as he took down the names of the truant.  Now it was on with my day. This incident brought back memories of my Senior Skip Day in 1975. It was tradition for Senior classes to go to Richfield Park and spend the day goofing off. Aout 10:10am on that warm May day, Mr. Knudtson, the Vice Principal, arrived with a school bus and hearded all on to it and back to school.  However, we Seniors took his intervention good naturedly and laughed about it. This was not the case today.

The reaction back at school was one of anger. Every class was talking about it; so much so that it was difficult to keep students on task.  Most of the students felt that the vice principal and the school violated their rights to a free breakfast. (Where in the Constitution are we gaurenteed free food?) One student told me that her dad had given her permission to go to Denny’s so Mr. B had no right in making her come back to school.  She also felt that since the kids had not been to the school first, they were not truant. Her feelings were angrily echoed by many.

Some of the kids thought that those students skipped out to go should be punished, but not those that went before school started.  On student who went to Denny’s just before 6am haughtly said that she got through the line and made it to school on time, therefore, everyone else should could have done the same thing. Isn’t rationalization is a wonderful thing.

Students weren’t the only gulity parties, some parents seemed to believe that free food was worth taking their kids out of school early.  A number of these students wer the ones that had numerous absences and a lot of missing work.

At the end of the day, the message given to our students from their parents and their peers was  that school is important unless there is free food involved.  Is it any wonder that achievement scores are low?

School has been out for 30 minutes. As I sit here writing this, I can hear a student in the hall proudly recounting his adventure at Denny’s.  I wonder if this scene occurred in other high schools, or is this just a shores of Lake Erie thing.  I am sure that the folks at Denny’s didn’t intend for their promotion to have this effct.  The Law of Unintended Consequences sure is a pain in the neck.

In my pre-web 2.0 world Professional Development (PD) could be basically be broken down into three categories:

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• Local Professional Development:

A boring sage-on-the-stage, supposedly “inspirational,” district inservice. My main accomplishment was getting lots of papers graded.

• Countywide Professional Development Day:

More conference like. Some years great, some years terrible. I got many papers graded.

• Conferences:

If I wanted to go, I’d have to pay my own way. Also, time away from class not necessarily approved if district didn’t think attendance “fit” with their PD plan.

None of these had much impact on what went on in my classroom. Sadly, I lost interest in gaining inspiration and new ideas for my teaching. I began to do just what my administrator and the state told me to do. My teaching suffered. I couldn’t wait to retire, but I still have 12 years to go. I was becoming the type of teacher that I despised. My love of teaching waned. I learned the technology and programs the school said I hadto and figured out ways to use these for my personal benefit, but that was it.

I became more and more frustrated with the politics of education. NCLB and the State of Michigan no longer seemed to care about anything other than test scores. They had lost the focus on the student. Flexibility gone. Creativity gone. Teach the “programmed” curriculum. My learning disabled students were left to struggle through curriculum that was (and still is) not appropriate for them. I locked myself away from other teachers to avoid the politics. I just wanted to be left alone in my classroom. I was suffering from burn out. I knew something had to change or I might as well quit and go do else.

Then a miracle occurred. I discovered iTunes, podcasts, and Wesley Fryer. I started listening to Wes’s Moving at the Speed of Creativity podcasts. As soon as I began listening, my world began to change. Wes inspired

Image by Wesley Fryer via Flickr

me to do more. He inspired me to start using technology as something other than a replacement for the typewriter. I began to think and care again. Ideas started sprouting. I began to figure out what I needed to do to become the teacher I wanted to be. The joy of teaching returned. (I hope Wes understands how much he’s improved my teaching and my life. Thanks Wes. Okay, enough with the fangirl stuff.)

I began to seek out more and more resources. I took charge of by PD for the first time in my almost 30 years in education.

I started using my twice a day 40 minute commute to learn from a number of wonderful educators. I’ve become so addicted to my PD in my car. I actually missed commuting over the Christmas break. I just wanted time alone in my car to learn. It has been a long time since I wanted to learn new things. (When I become passionate about something I develop an obsession-like focus. I must master whatever I am doing. It’s been years since that focus was my teaching. Now if the Special Ed paperwork would go away, my world would be idyllic.)

I started signing up for PD opportunities that were offered through the Monroe County Intermediate School District (MCISD), signing up for just about anything that Jim Dornberg presented. He mentioned this 23 Things class to me and I quickly signed up. I didn’t need the carrot of 20 PD hours, but is was a very nice bonus. I just wanted to know more!

This year when the Countywide PD Program arrived in my inbox, I quickly chose to attend Leslie Fisher’s gadgets session. (I’ve always loved gadgets.) In that session she formally introduced me to Twitter and the Professional Learning Community (PLC) that thrives there. I was hooked. During that session, I met Cheryl Lykowski (on Twitter she’s @clykowski) another Monroe County educator and I began to follow her. I also stared following Jim (@jdornberg on Twitter). From there my PLC has exploded. Twitter is an amazing resource to help locate some of the best resources on the web.

So this is my new definition of professional development:

Web 2.0 PD is a personal, flexible way to invigorate both teaching and learning. The learner controls what is learned, when it’s learned, and where it’s learned.

This definition is what I have adopted as my personal philosophy for my own, ongoing PD.

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(What follows is part of the Thing 22 assignment. This stuff didn’t really fit the the rest of the post.)

The main disadvantage is that there is so much material available that it can be difficult to locate and determine the most effective personal development plan. Carefully selecting your colleagues for your PLC is probably the best way to go about this.

As for future PD Offerings: I would love see another class like this offered through the ISD. I found it very helpful. The only thing I would change is to allow the end date to be more open ended. A few of the people taking this class dropped out because they ran out of time. Maybe this could be an continually ongoing PD opportunity.

Also I would think that offerings on each of these and other specific web 2.0 topics (Jim – like those on your Google Doc), would be another way to go. I would love an entire day devoted to face-to-face web 2.0 networking would be great.

Bringing Wesley Fryer in for the Countywide Inservice would be fantastic.

Now on to Thing 23

I just want to scream. I received this directive in an email from my special ed director.

I called the State Department regarding the appropriate way to write Annual Goals on the IEP. Here’s a Quote from above,” The IEP team should always focus on student needs, not grade level:”DO NOT SET GOALS FOR A GRADE LEVEL TO INCREASE TO THE NEXT GRADE LEVEL”.

A couple of questions that come to mind.

First, what does this mean? Does it mean this goal, “Suzy will raise her reading level by one grade level as measured on the (insert name of test here) by her next annual IEP,” Is no longer acceptable. Does it mean a goal like this: Suzy will master the writing skills necessary to earn her 9th grade English Credit ? Does it mean a goal like Suzy will earn 7.5 credits so that she will advance to the 10th grade? I should note that we’re are not to allowed to use check off goals. We have to write new ones every year.

Second, we have been continually told that all goals must be concrete and measurable, so now what do we use?

Finally, given the new Michigan Merit Curriculum in which all students are suppose to master the same material regardless of disability, what are high school special education teachers suppose to base their goals on? We no longer have the luxury of being able to re mediate anything. All we do is accommodate.

It seems the State of Michigan has lost touch with the needs of Special Education students. I am so frustrated. My department is meeting with the director will this afternoon. Somehow I doubt she’ll be able to clarify this further.

Does anyone have any thoughts? I’ll keep you posted.

Update: I was right. She couldn’t really explain it. It appears that we can’t use any of my sample goals. We are suppose to be vague, just show “reasonable progress” in the courses we teach. If we don’t have a student in a direct instruction class, we don’t have to document progress. This makes no sense.

One of my favorite bloggers and podcasters is Joe Wood, a middle school science teacher who loves Web 2.0 and struggles with the most effective ways to use this technology in his classes. I really like that he doesn’t have all of the answers. Through his attempts at using technology to become a more effective teacher, he has inspired me, a graying, old veteran of the classroom, to reinvent my classes (Oops, my inner fangirl tendencies slipped through.)

On his blog, Joe Wood Online, Joe posted the following:

Have you ever asked your students why they think they’re attending school? Try it. You’ll get some interesting answers. Yesterday I posed this question to one of my classes, curious what their responses might be. I found my students had great scripted answers, such as “to get an education” or “to make my parents proud.” I even received a few “because its the law.” Interestingly though, as we dug deeper into these responses few students could explain why attending school today is important to their future goals.

I thought about this and posted some thoughts as comments to his post. I also asked my students to blog about this (Mrs. Chi’s Classroom Blogs). Not all responded, but most did. Their unedited responses are posted on their individual blogs. Please read their thoughts if you are interested, but I digress.

I’m not sure that most teachers could answer that same question with more than the same well rehearsed answers. I am sure that each of us believes that we are giving each student what he/she needs to live a successful adult life. We “prepare” them for the future. In my case I also add that I help them develop the skills they need to work around whatever challenges they might face along the way.

As I read that back I think that sounds a little bit pompous. As teachers do we really prepare them? Is everything we present in class really needed in the “real world?” Can we clearly explain to yourselves, colleagues, parents and students how our course content will apply to each individual student’s future? I am not sure that I can.

In this day of high stakes testing, most of the content that we teach, we teach because it is on the state test. Assessment is our reason. I find this to be very sad.

I agree that every student should be able to read, write, and calculate at the level necessary to succeed in their chosen post-secondary training/education programs and in their chosen professions. My emphasis here is on the individual student. While all students will need some additional training/education after high school, not every single student will need (or want) to attend a four year university, nor do I believe that society wants them to do that either.

We still need auto mechanics, millwrights, chefs, merchants, construction workers, and computer hardware specialists. We still want actors, artists, and athletes. So I ask the question, “Do all of these professions require the same preparation?” Clearly, the answer is “no.”

In Michigan, all students (regardless of disability, gifts, or career goals) are required to take Algebra II, Chemistry or Physics, and a Foreign Language. Also the major increase in the required courses severely limits the amount of time a student has to take auto shop or band. While a applaude the state’s desire to make our workforce the most highly qualified worforce in the nation, I don’t think this rigid curriculum is the best way to go about it.

To be fair, there are provisions for Algebra II content to be taught in industrial arts classes in an applied fashion. The parents of a general education student can request that their student can be placed on a “rigorous” personal curriculum after the student has failed the first semester of Algebra II. This will be after the first semester of a student’s junior year. Seems to me that we’re setting these kids up for failure.

The most important thing that we can give our students is the love of learning. Forcing them to take courses that they can barely pass doesn’t do this. Where in this curriculum is there time for students to gain the love of life long learning when they can’t specialize in areas of interest? I got into education to help each of my students reach his or her potential and goals. Since “the test” trumps everything else, it seems to me that we have lost sight of the student as a learner; they are just test scores.

Is it any wonder that given this environment that our students can’t see any other reason to attend school than “It’s required by law?”

How has learning changed? In some ways, a lot. In others, not so much.

A couple of quotes form the Time Magazine article really struck me.

1. “It’s important that students know how to manage it, interpret it, validate it, and how to act on it,” says Dell executive Karen Bruett, who serves on the board of the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, a group of corporate and education leaders focused on upgrading American education.

2. “Jobs in the new economy–the ones that won’t get outsourced or automated–”put an enormous premium on creative and innovative skills, seeing patterns where other people see only chaos,” says Marc Tucker, an author of the skills-commission report and president of the National Center on Education and the Economy.”

These skills have always been necessary and have been developed in High Schools pre-NCLB. I learned these things in my High School Debate and Forensics program at Kearsley High School in Flint, MI. Unfortunately, few students took advantage of the opportunities these programs provided. In the 70′s my blue-collar high school was a “prep school” for the GM factories ran the city. Less than 3% of my class went to college. Those that did, did not return to Flint. As we graduated from college we witnessed the first round of GM’s downsizing that would turn downtown Flint into a relative ghost town. At my 5-year class reunion in 1980, there were classmates who had been laid off from GM never to return. For many of my classmates lacked the ability to adapt to change, to think outside the box, and to see opportunities in the future. The few who did, got retraining and left.

I think that if we are to serve our students, we must stress these same skills, so that they can meat the challenges our changing economy brings. Right know I have a since of deja vu. I feel that I am watching Monroe struggle with the same problems that Flint has and still is facing.

I fear that Michigan’s new graduation requirements, while admirable, when combined with the high stakes test, the Michigan Merit exam and NCLB’s AYP requirements will force schools to teach to the test rather than allow students the chance to create and explore this new world.

The appropriate use of web2.0 collaborative learning is a step in the right direction, but it is only a step. We need to get our students ask the “Why and How” questions when confronted an issue just like I was trained to do in Mrs. Turner’s Debate Class. The question “Why is this happening?” can lead to powerful critical thinking. It can challenge our beliefs, our thought processes. It can lead to creative solutions to complex problems. Likewise, the question “How can this be changed?” can lead all of us to create new answers.

This weekend I watched my 18 year son, a UofM-Dearborn freshman struggle with an argumentative essay for his composition class. He knows how to structure and write a competent paper, but he is lacking the ability to develop a complete, persuasive argument. He can use the web, but he lacks the facility to use any search engine other than the basic Google search. This kid is a math major (“Mom, calculus is fun. Get over it!”). He graduated with honors from a great high school that regularly turns out Merit Scholars. He took computer software classes, yet he was never taught basic web skills. I fear that we are and will continue to turn out students like him who look good on paper, but lack the skills and the thought processes to handle this complex world.