Spring conferences were tonight. That made me think of this list of from Scholastic. It is their five ground rules for successful conferences with parents.
Begin the year by explaining how and when you’ll keep in touch with them.
Never feel pressured to make an important decision, evaluation, or assessment during a parent conference or conversation.
Let parents know they can trust you. Be discrete: Avoid discussing students with other parents or engaging in any negative faculty-room talk. I also make this a rule for par
Assure parents that you will inform them immediately about any concerns you might have with regard to their child.
When presenting a concern to parents, ALWAYS be ready to explain what strategies you’ve already used to address the issue and what new strategies you are considering.
My social studies lessons were loaded with dates and names my first few years teaching. While there are some dates and names which every student should learn, my thinking shifted a few years ago. Instead of focusing on dates and names, I wanted students to better understand big concepts and themes in history.
Since I teach in Pennsylvania, students learn about William Penn, a quaker, who founded Pennsylvania, in part, to escape religious persecution in England. The big theme I want my students to gain from this is that people have been treated poorly because of their beliefs, and at times find ways to escape that persecution. This is a big theme that is not only applicable to William Penn but so many other areas of history.
The trouble was how do I help 10-year-olds better understand the injustices William Penn and others faced in England because of the King? As usual, when I’m at a loss, I turn to ice cream. It is usually Ben and Jerry’s The Tonight Dough, but I digress.
Every year when I teach William Penn, I write two different types of ice cream on the board. Students write their name under the flavor they prefer. Then anybody who did not chose “my” favorite flavor is given less homework that night. Fourth graders get passionate about ice cream and homework. (Don’t worry, students who do not have to do the homework, do it the next night.)
The next day we do a four corner activity. I give students a paper with four boxes. The boxes are:
I benefited and it was fair because…
I benefited and it was unfair because…
I did not benefit and it was fair because…
I did not benefit and it was unfair because…
Students are given a few minutes to write in one of the boxes based on whether they benefited from the ice cream/homework activity and whether they thought it was fair or unfair. Then they move to a corner of the room which corresponds with their box. Almost every year, there are students at three of the corners but nobody at the “I did not benefit and it was fair” corner. They talk to the other people at their corner, and then we share out and have a class discussion.
One student who had extra homework explained why this system is unfair.
For a few years, the activity would then move into the lesson about William Penn. We would read about him in our social studies books, answer some questions, etc. This year, however, I did something different. After our class discussion, I asked students to go back and write in red pencil any changes or additions they would make to their original thoughts. It was a way for them to reflect on any new ideas they had based on the class discussion.
Some students stayed in the box they originally chose, while others decided that what they originally thought was fair was unfair. I asked one student why he moved from “I benefited and it was fair” to “I benefited and it was unfair.” He told me that he changed his mind after hearing one of his classmates talk about how it was unfair to do homework simply because his favorite ice cream isn’t vanilla. He said, “Mr. Rashid, hearing him say how unfair it was really made me think. I had only thought about how it affected me. Now I’m thinking about the people who had to do more homework. It doesn’t seem fair anymore.” It was a bit of empathy in the middle of the lesson that will help him relate to William Penn’s struggles.
Here is a student who changed from “fair” to “unfair” after our class discussion.
This has worked so much better than simply reading a text about William Penn and having students memorize dates and names. Students are invested and have some background knowledge of injustice. They are using reading, writing, speaking, and listening skills.
Every lesson can improve, but I feel this is a really great way to introduce a pretty deep concept to fourth graders. Although, it could be better if we actually ate ice cream during the lesson. Heck, maybe Ben and Jerry’s can make a William Penn flavor sometime soon. An ice cream loving teacher can dream, can’t he?
My students love high fives. We high five when they go to lunch. We high five when they leave at the end of the day. We high five when students work hard in class. It’s just something we do in our classroom.
Of course, with concerns over Coronavirus, we’ve had to adjust our high five policies. My primary goal as a teacher is to keep my students safe. That includes creating and maintaining a classroom environment that is as free as a fourth grade classroom can be from germs. So, we’ve moved from high fives to air high fives. We keep our hands a good apart and simply try to make the best of a tough situation.
We will keep the air high fives going until we know more about this virus. Until then… air high five!
I woke up this morning at 8:00 and was very pleased that I got a full eight hours of sleep. This rarely happens for me. Despite a full night’s rest I was still a little groggy and unsure why. Then I realized it was really 7:00, and I’d only gotten seven hours of sleep. Or was it 8:00, and I did get eight hours of sleep? I couldn’t remember whether I adjusted my alarm clock.
A similar scenario probably played out in houses across the country today as we moved the clocks ahead one hour for daylight savings. We lost an hour of sleep, and this afternoon it felt like an entire day of lost sleep. If you’re like me, it takes a couple days for your body to get back to normal after the time shift.
This happens to our students as well. According to a 2016 article in The Denver Post, sleep expert Lisa Meltzer says, “We have tons of evidence showing even small differences in sleep make a lot of difference in behavior.” And who doesn’t have at least a small difference in sleep after moving the clocks ahead one full hour?
In fact, some research shows that students who have even a minimal disruption in their sleep routine can test a full letter grade below their normal performance when properly rested. So that A students might get a B on an assessment when they’re not fully rested.
Teenagers need eight to 10 hours of sleep a night, which might be hard when they “lost” an hour over the weekend. The concern for students getting an adequate amount of sleep has some school systems across the country reevaluating their start times. In fact, California recently mandated later start times for secondary students.
So, tomorrow, the day after we moved the clocks forward, might not be the best day to give that big assessment. Students’ internal clocks might still be an hour behind and their performance might be a letter grade behind as well.
You’re in the middle of a lesson and two students are talking and off task. Another student gets up and says she forgot her pencil. Then a different student says he forgot his homework.
How the teacher reacts to these distractions can set the tone for the lesson, the day, and affect relationships in the classroom.
Charles Swindoll said, “Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.” This is true at work, with relationships outside of work, and every aspect of life.
Things are going to go wrong in life, but how we react to those ups and downs is what will determine our success and happiness. The water heater might go at home. It’s part of homeownership. How do we react when that happens? Your spouse or significant other might leave in the morning angry at something you said or did. How you react can have an enormous impact on the success of your relationship and your happiness.
Which brings us back to the original scenario. How do you react to the students who did not come to class prepared ? Maybe it’s worth privately checking in with the students to better understand why they’re not prepared. Maybe there is something happening at home. Maybe the students simply forgot. (I forget things every now and again.)
Small disruptions to the day can certainly be frustrating. They often frustrate me internally, but I try to remind me self that 90% of life is how we react. Taking the time to understand and teach a life lesson will probably have a greater impact than simply giving consequences.
About 15 years ago I was in a bookstore and found a book called Start Late, Finish Rich by David Bach. I was intrigued by the title and description on the inside cover, so I bought the book. This book started my interest in personal finance.
I want to be clear, I am not a certified financial planner, a CPA, or an other licensed money manager. Over the last 15 years, however, I’ve spent a great deal of time learning more about personal finance.
How does all this impact the teaching profession? One of the best things we can do is make sure we take care of ourselves. If we are in a better place physically, emotionally, and mentally, we can take better care of our students. There have been a lot of conversations lately about teacher wellbeing. I’m glad to see those conversations starting but rarely see much talk about financial wellbeing for teachers.
There’s basically two main factors of personal finance: money coming in and going out. In Start Late, Finish Rich, David Bach talks about the latte factor. Let’s assume that you buy a latte (or whatever kind of coffee you drink in the morning) and it costs $5 for each cup. That’s $25 each week and $100 each month. All of a sudden, that latte starts to add up. If you forgo your daily coffee, you can find some extra money in your budget.
A CNBC published an article yesterday shares seven other ways to save money. They reminded me of latte-factor-style savings.
Eating out
Phone upgrades
Clothing and apparel
Lottery tickets
Extended warranties
Cable TV
Impulse purchases.
If you take a look where you’re spending your money, there’s a good chance you will find a latte-like way to save. It might not seem like much at first, but those little savings add up over time.
There is a wonderful story in the Philadelphia Inquirer about an elementary school principal named Fatihah Abdur-Rahman. She was a mother at the age of 17 and had a second child at the age of 19. The family struggled to make ends meet and ended up homeless for a period of time. Abdur-Rahman persevered, however, eventually getting a degree, teaching, and working her way up to principal.
What is amazing about her story is not just that she overcame obstacles. What is really amazing is that she is trying to inspire young people in her school and community to be great. She mentors young girls in her building and organizes summer learning activities. Abdur-Rahman is using her struggles and her ability to overcome obstacles to inspire young people. I love the message she shares with some of the girls she mentors: “You were born to win! So go out and be a winner.”
Take a minute to read the article about Fatihah Abdur-Rahman. It is an inspirational story.
What does the perfect high school graduate look like? Top 10 in their class? Numerous extra curricular activities? Study abroad? Volunteer with local charities? 4.0 GPA?
That’s probably what most people have in mind of the “perfect” graduate. I was not that graduate, and that was not the end of the world for me.
I started thinking about all of this when I read Mandy Froehlich’s recently post titled I’m Not Your Ideal College Graduate. She talks about how her path to where she is as an educator was anything but the traditional path to education. This really hit home for me.
When I was 17, I left for college. To say that I was not emotionally ready for the collegiate experience at the age of 17 is a bit of an understatement. At the time, I thought I wanted to be a draftsman. Why did I want to do that? Honestly, it was the only thing in high school that got me remotely excited. After a year-and-a-half studying drafting, I realized it was the last thing I wanted to do for the next 30 years of my life.
So, I moved back home and went to community college. This was by far one of the most important points in my life. I was able to take general educations classes and get a better idea of what I wanted to do with my life. Until that point, I felt an enormous rush from ninth grade on to “figure out what you’re going to do with your life.” I remember a high school guidance counselor asking me when I was a junior in high school what I wanted to do with my life. I was 15. I had no clue.
One of those classes I took at community college was Communications 101. That one class sparked a love and passion for television production. I eventually transferred back to a four-year state school and majored in television production. That was the first time I felt like I hit my academic stride.
I left with a degree and worked at three television stations in three different states over the next six years. Some unbelievable experiences were made possible working in television: riding in a presidential motorcade, taping four NFL games from the sidelines, flying along the U.S.-Mexico border with the National Guard, etc.
I loved my time in television and feel very fortunate to have worked in the industry. Eventually, I thought there was something different waiting for me in the world. After a great deal of soul searching, I enrolled in an elementary teacher certification program. I was 30 years old at the time. I didn’t start teaching until I was almost 32. That 15-year-old sitting in the high school guidance counselor’s office would have never been able to predict that career path.
Becoming a teacher is the best thing I’ve done in my professional life. While I’m not sure I will work as a classroom teacher the rest of my career, I’m almost certain I will stay in the education field.
Reflecting on all this made me wonder why are we in such a rush to make our students and children decide what they want to do after high school? Are 16-, 17-, and 18-year-old kids really ready to make that decision? I don’t know the answer to that for every student, but I can tell you that the 17-year-old me had no clue. Thankfully I had some amazing people in my life who were willing to walk along the journey of life and career with me.
The words we use with our students are important. I was reminded of this when I saw a tweet from my state’s department of education. The tweet gave some ideas to use instead of the popular “Muffins with Mom” or “Donuts with Dad.” On the surface, these two names might not seem like a problem, but what about the students who do not have a mother or father in the picture? How does that make these children feel when they don’t have a mother at “Muffins with Mom” or a dad at the “Donuts with Dad” event?
This is one of the many reasons why the words we use with our students are so important. I try to keep this in mind when talking to my students. I try not to say, “Have your mom or dad help with this tonight at home.” Instead, I say, “Ask your homework helper to give you a hand with this.” This homework helper could be a mom, dad, grandparent, sibling, or neighbor. It’s one way I try to make all students feel included.
What words do you use in your classroom to help students feel comfortable? What alternatives to “Donuts with Dad” and “Muffins with Mom” could we use instead?
One of my favorite movies is The Shawshank Redemption. In one scene, the main character wears dress shoes in prison, but nobody notices he’s not wearing his prison-issued shoes. It makes the point that people rarely pay attention to the details of a person’s clothing.
I’m reminded of that scene whenever I think of a productivity technique I first heard about with President Obama. (Disclaimer: This is not a political post and will not become one.) Regardless of your politics, you’ve probably seen at least one of President Obama’s speeches. Here’s a question for you: What color suit was he wearing? The answer: blue or gray.
That’s because President Obama only wears blue and gray suits. His reasoning has to do with something called decision fatigue. I first heard of this phenomenon from an article about the former president and his choice of clothing. When you’re the leader of the free world, you have a lot of decisions to make. The color of your suit isn’t nearly as important as world trade agreements and international markets. So, Mr. Obama limited his clothing decisions and spent some of that energy worrying about other things like foreign and domestic policy.
I thought the idea was intriguing, so I started to do it on a smaller scale. I wear mostly the same thing to work every day: khakis and a polo or long sleeve shirt. Most of the colors I pick are interchangeable – almost every shirt will match with either beige or blue khakis. This makes my morning run much more smoothly and frees up mental energy for the 1,500 decisions I’ll have to make in my classroom that day.
