Unit B, First Days of School, Reading Workshop

TLW use questions to propel reading of a section on expectations.

Plan: Monitor questions before, during and after reading Unit B.  Unit is about positive expectations which before reading I assume to mean that I would have the expectation that all students can learn and I can expect that all of them will learn from what I teach.  Based on the previous unit, I believe the authors' intent is to present ideas clearly and simply, to back ideas up with real-world teachers and examples, to use positive psychology on us (the readers), and to inform us to set positive expectations.

I began with writing questions for the authors spurred by the reading.  However, mid-way through that changed.  The authors gave their examples, which were mostly grade school and a few middle school examples.  I wanted to address my questions as they pertained to high school students. This is simple reading and the only thing that is going to add to what I am reading is to learn more about how high schoolers think.  And I had a perfect resource for my questions: my son who just graduated from high school this summer.  So, part of my responses are stticky note questions or thoughts I had as I was reading, and part are questions asked of my son.

Regarding quote, "There is absolutely no research correlation between success and family background, race, national origin, financial status, or even educational accomplishments.  There is but one correlation with success, and that is ATTITUDE."  I disagree with this.  There has been a lot written about educational accomplishment, with more accomplishment with affluent parents because they push or encourage their children with higher expectations, poverty districts often do not have as good as teachers as higher economic districts, and there is often a difference in the races that are restricted to poverty-stricken districts.  Attitude I will agree plays a major role and attitudes may vary between districts.  If there wasn't a difference in all of this, there would be no need for programs such as Woodrow Wilson to enhance student learning in high-need districts.

Regarding research experiment on expectations and increase in IQ scores, I was glad to see that teacher expectations made a difference on 20 random students. But the text did not say what the teachers did to achieve this.  Did they spend more time with these 20 students on a one-on-one basis to facilitate learning, since everyone else in the classes remained at the same IQ?  How did they test IQ, and isn't IQ testing arbritrary?  Learning increases, but does IQ really significantly increase in 9 months' time?

Dress for respect:  I don't question myself on what is appropriate for dress in class; I already have a good idea of what that will look like.  But there have been questions about what is appropriate dress from a couple of my young colleagues, so I wonder for them.  They want to be professional, but they don't want to dress old.  The text offers some suggestions, and I mentioned that there are certain stores with professional clothes that are not age-specific, that are stylish and can cross or span generations.  Chapter 8 mentions that we dress for respect, credability, acceptance and authority.  I asked my son to reflect on his teachers, how they dressed, and if how they dressed affected his perception and respect for those teachers.  The answer was yes, he respected teachers more and liked that they dressed nice; men in nice shirts and even a tie is ok, women dressy, but not too dressy.  A Spanish teacher dressed frumpy and often came to class unshaven for several days in a row; he didn't respect this teacher much and as a result didn't feel he was a very good teacher.  He mentioned that a few female teachers dressed in sweat pants on Fridays (their casual day), but he didn't like that.  He was fine with jeans and other casual clothing for casual Fridays, but somehow the sweats bothered him a little.  On the other hand, he had two women teachers that were dressy.  One, which he respected a lot, always dressed really nice, but not the extreme of business suit nice, although once in a while she dressed like one would dress if going out.  Another female teacher dressed business-suit like all of the time (with skirts or pants) and he didn't like it; he felt she was overdressed and unapproachable.  After analyzing this, he realized that he was accepting of the first woman over-dressing at times because she was kind, friendly and warm.  However, the second woman did not have a warm, friendly, inviting personality and this in combination with business-suit attire made her unapproachable--so attitude goes a long way!  To add to this, I agree with the text that we are modeling appropriate dress for the occupational/professional world they will be entering after they graduate.

In regards to the inviting section of Unit B--I wonder how we can connect and be inviting to parents with which we have a language barrier?  How can we make them feel included if we cannot understand each other?  Their children would have to be continual translaters of notes, learning targets, pre-assessments, etc.

Finally, I asked my son who were his best teachers that he feels he learned the most from and why. 
Answer:  He gave me 3 names, all of which often  related material to the real world when possible, and they were nice, fun, funny, liked teaching, cared about the students, and treated ALL students with respect.  He said they never yelled and then he instructed me to never yell saying that students will tune you out and that it would be ineffective.  They will learn not to listen to you.  He said that he best teachers always smiled and were happy and he respected them a lot.  He then said that you knew to change a behavior when they became a little firm, looked at you, and asked or told you to stop the behavior.  Calm firmness was all it took.  And students would stop the behavior out of respect the great majority of the time, but there may always be "one" student who just won't fully behave, and a threat of having going to the office is usually effective.

It was interesting to learn that one of these teachers I respected and learned the most from had only one rule given at the beginning of the school year.  That rule was "don't sit on the desks."  And every time someone sat on a desk, he would tell them to get off of the desk.  When asked why, he always responded, just because.  At the end of the year he told the students about the rule. He said that he picked the stupidest rule that he could fin one year that meant absolutely nothing and has used it ever since because this is what he has found to be most effective--students behaved well with only this one, silly rule.  :)

Engagement Level: 10