Measurable Objectives?

Part of being a school which implements the International Baccalaureate Middle Years Programme is identifying a student each month who exemplifies one of the learner profile traits that the IB MYP has prescribed.

Full Disclosure: I am not a fan of the IB MYP, and I believe that character education is best conducted at home or in context, and I also agree with Alfie Kohn that awards are more effective in reinforcing the authority of those who grant them than for praising those we intend to commend or encouraging their peers to be more successful. BUT, A few years ago, in an attempt to make these monthly recognitions more meaningful for the students, our team implemented a peer nomination form. The teachers still made the final designation, but it was based on what the kids wrote.

Has the process improved since then? It's hard to say. Many 11-year-olds are still inclined to nominate their friends, if not the person sitting next to them at the moment they are offered the opportunity. They are kids, after all, and they don't fully understand their role in the process, but teaching them that is part of what we do.

Often, we adults are tempted to dismiss their nominations for those very reasons, and in the interest of time and efficiency, we want to designate a student ourselves. Then, too, we feel compelled to take into consideration the demographics of just who is winning these awards. Are there too many girls? Too few minority kids?

In the end, it seems like the objective, if there ever was one, is lost. A name is read on the announcements, a certificate is granted, a photo is posted on the school web site, and then we all move on to the hundreds of other things that occupy our days.

Girl Rising

We went to a special screening of the documentary Girl Rising this evening. Organized by a parent at our school, the theater was packed, mostly with women and girls. The movie itself, the stories of nine girls from developing countries and the impact that education has and might have on their lives, was interesting, a compelling mix of sobering and uplifting. The production was creative, too, partnering each girl with a renowned female writer from her region and a celebrity narrator, but it was the girls who stole the show.

For the last twenty years I have worked in one of the most diverse schools in our nation; in any given year we have students from well over 25 countries, and the faces of the girls in the movie, from Peru, Haiti, Ethiopia, Cambodia, Egypt, Nepal, India, Sierra Leone, and Afghanistan echoed the faces of so many of the students I have taught. Even their names were the same in some cases: Mariama, Amina, Azmera, Suma, and Yasmine.

This movie reminded me that as many problems as we think we have in American education today, what we offer our students, while perhaps never good enough, is still quite extraordinary.

Tomayto, Tomahto

The last time I was at the eye doctor, she told me I had a huge floater in one eye, right in my line vision. "Does it bother you?" she asked.

I shrugged and told her that I don't see it at all. I know that such an occurrence is common-- the brain often just automatically tunes out interference-- the better to get on with the business of survival.

After the visit, I was feeling quite proud of my brain. I even wondered what other "blockages" in my life it might be trained to simply ignore. Before I could come up with a working list, though, it occurred to me that another word for what my brain was up to is denial.

That doesn't seem quite so peachy.

Mind Over Matter

There was actually a point in the day yesterday when I became convinced that I could solve Rubik's Cube. Perhaps I was delusional at the end of a long day, but with all my email answered and my lessons planned for Monday, the bright colors of the cube caught my eye.

I lifted the cube from where I keep it behind my desk, mostly to amuse fidgety students. Focus on the corners and remember the centers are stationary. That's what the guy on the 80's documentary had said. He must know, as a teenager, he had a best selling book on the subject.

Was I making headway when the phone rang? Maybe, it seemed like it, so much so that when my friend asked what I was doing, I openly confessed to "solving Rubik's Cube!" We laughed about it, but as we talked, I mentioned the ukulele, and I realized that the baby steps I have taken over the last few months with that cute little instrument have instilled a new confidence in me.

For the first 50 years of my life, I hadn't been able to wrap my brain around playing any musical instrument; much like Rubik's Cube, all the permutations of fingers, strings, keys, and notes seemed like too much. But that isn't exactly true anymore.

Oh, I didn't solve the cube yesterday, and I can't really play the ukulele, yet... but I haven't ruled either one out.

What's Out There

Even though it was nearly 5:30 when I left school today, the sun was still high in the breezy sky. It wasn't as warm as it had looked from my classroom window, and I shivered a bit and picked up my pace as I headed for my station wagon across the lot.

You never know what you might see on the ground outside a school: the random exotic item is often crushed by bus tires right alongside the quotidian pens and yellow pencils so casually left behind by students in their rush to get home. Over the years I've found money, books, keys, eye glasses, prescription medication, and more than one phone on my way out the door.

Because it's a huge parking lot in a mixed-use facility, there is often a lot of activity. Parents pick up their children from the after-school program; motorcyclists practice in the far corner; Bolivian dance troupes clap and spin and march in the big empty space where late the teachers parked.

Depending on the season, leaves bud, rustle, or fall. Some nights, flocks of starlings pick over the sparse grass on the narrow medians; other times murders of crows mob all the surrounding trees.

Tonight, though, I saw something new. An 6-inch blot rippled dark brown on the sidewalk. As I grew closer, I saw that it was made of ants, more ants than I have ever seen together. They were swarming over each other in a pile 5 or 6 ants deep, and for what? I have no idea; I couldn't see anything.

I left them there, stepped over them carefully and continued on to my car, but I'll tell you what: I scratched a million invisible itches all the way home.

Pep Talk?

My students have been doing a mini-unit on suffixes, and today was the quiz. It was a little more challenging than many of them were expecting, so I wasn't too surprised when one boy approached my desk with quite a few blanks on his paper and more than a little frustration. "I thought I knew these," he said, "but I can't get any more."

I looked over his test with him and tried to help triage the questions. There were two that I was pretty sure he could get, if he just gave them some more thought. He was still clearly discouraged, though.

And that's when I heard myself say, "C'mon! Just focus on eternity and disappointment."

He knew what I meant.

Six Minutes 'til Post Time

We're continental diners around here... dinner at 8 is pretty much the norm, and forgive us Josh, but in the summer it can be much, much later. Part of the problem, or perhaps more accurately, the "situation," is that our days are full, and a fine meal together at the end of the day seems like the least we can do for ourselves and each other, so we take the time to make that happen.

Having said so, and being more or less at peace with this lifestyle (which has worked for centuries in other, less puritanical, societies-- siesta, anyone?), I will say that rising at 5:30 to make it to school for our [ungodly] start-time is an impediment to such a timeline. A logical person will note that one of these deadlines is non-negotiable, and the other is not, so we have been trying to have all our commitments (ahem, you, blog) met, and dinner on the table by eight every evening.

Done!