In his newest book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell takes a long, hard, in-depth look at success. In the book he takes apart many of the American myths about success and looks at what it really takes.
One of the claims he makes in his book is that it takes a minimum of 10,000 hours of practice in order to become expert in doing something. If you want to be an expert in swimming, you need to spend 10,000 hours swimming. If you wish to be an expert teacher, you need to spend 10,000 hours teaching. If you want to be an expert writer, you need to spend 10,000 hours writing.
He even helpfully breaks this down a little more. 10,000 hours works out to be three hours a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, for ten years. I was talking about this with a friend and we figured that meant about five years to become an expert teacher. Then I rethought. Even if we double the number of teaching hours from three to six, most teaching contracts run a maximum of 180-185 days. So that again, in my revised thinking, works out to about ten years.
Then I look back at my teaching career. I still apologize to students I taught my first year when I run across them. I assure them that I have improved since then. By my fifth year, I was just becoming relatively confident. I had the basics down and was working on improving. It took me a little over a decade to really feel like I had mastered the job. And even that feeling fades on occasion.
When I add to that the thought that, according to statistics compilrd by the NEA, 50% of all new teachers quit within their first five years, I have a real problem. Why are so many of these new professionals leaving before they have the chance to acquire expertise? So I have known have run away hard after just one year.
I think the answer might be in the way teachers are prepared for the classroom. Most teachers have minimum exposure to students prior to getting their first job. They have probably interned, but that is such a short time. Also, there is always that safety net of the supervising teacher. Sometimes, more than a safety net.
For instance, my supervising teacher never left her classroom. She sat in the back of the room quietly doing paperwork. However, when the class would get too loud to suit her, she would raise her head up from that paperwork and look meaningfully around the room. Sure enough they would get quiet. And I would (the next fall) go into my teaching career with no real experience in managing classroom behavior. I survived, but it was a rough year.
Tossing new teachers into the deep end with nothing to cling to but an anchor might not be the most effective way to retain teachers and help them get to their 10,000 hours. Doctors do it with paid, years long internships. Lawyers do it with years of case file work. I think it would be exceedingly rare for a first year doctor to provide surgery unassisted, or a first year lawyer to argue a case in open court with no supervision. Yet teachers are required to this all the time.
Maybe some sort of paid, years long internship for teachers is needed. But the cost, some will cry out. It is too expensive. How expensive is it now to have rotating teachers? How expensive is it to future generations that the teachers they had were so very far from being an expert in their field? There will be up from costs, no doubt––but the pay off on the back end might well be incalculable.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Friday, December 5, 2008
Some Self Promotion
In an effort to use my slanted sense of humor to help supplement my teacher's salary, I started a little shop on cafepress.com. Please feel free to come on in and look around. I have a couple of more ideas that I plan to add to the shop shortly.
And, as ever, I thank you for your support.
And, as ever, I thank you for your support.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
NWP National Conference 2008
I started to write a blog entry about being at the NWP national conference in San Antonio several times. And, to be brutally honest, they all sucked. Big time.
I read and reread them trying to figure out why they sucked so much. Basically it came down to all of them being some variation of a report of my notes taken in various sessions. And those notes, in contrast to most of the sessions, were boring. I wanted a blog entry that was something more than a dry report of my sessions. That kind of recap will be done in a different forum.
I thought about writing about my time spent with friends from my writing project. Then I rethought that. We had a lot of intensely personal discussions that are not fodder for a public blog posting. I will say that we need to work on getting everyone to row in the same direction. Also, an end to the circular firing squads would be a positive step as well.
So, what to write about? I decided to go meta. I asked the big question to myself and now will try to work out the answer. The big question(s): Why do I come to these conferences? What do I get out of them?
Being a teacher can be a lonely job. I am surrounded by students all day and rarely get to interact with my peers on a professional level (Let’s face it, most school conversations quickly devolve into bitching sessions.). Being at these conferences lets me interact more professionally. I am seen as a valued, knowledgeable colleague and treated that way. I get to talk about deeper educational issues than I do at home. At this conference in particular, I was able to not just express my personal interest in social justice issues, but share with a tableful of people who all shared that common interest. And to discuss ways of integrating these ideals into a classroom setting.
Every year I get to meet with friends from previous years and friends from a listserv I am a member of. I get to socialize and be a grown-up, no mean trick if you are the father of a rambunctious five year old. I can have some time to try to concentrate for more than a few minutes.
I get a feeling of renewal attending these events. I feel a little more charged up, a little more optimistic, a little more eager to try different ideas and approaches in the classroom.
I also regain a deeper appreciation of my wife and daughter. I love them dearly, but sometimes get so absorbed in my teaching I take them for granted. Being away from them for several days reminds me on a visceral level now much they mean to me and how much their absence hurts.
So I get some professional insights, some site work done, some socializing, and a renewed appreciation of family right before Thanksgiving. Not a bad pay back for my attendance.
I read and reread them trying to figure out why they sucked so much. Basically it came down to all of them being some variation of a report of my notes taken in various sessions. And those notes, in contrast to most of the sessions, were boring. I wanted a blog entry that was something more than a dry report of my sessions. That kind of recap will be done in a different forum.
I thought about writing about my time spent with friends from my writing project. Then I rethought that. We had a lot of intensely personal discussions that are not fodder for a public blog posting. I will say that we need to work on getting everyone to row in the same direction. Also, an end to the circular firing squads would be a positive step as well.
So, what to write about? I decided to go meta. I asked the big question to myself and now will try to work out the answer. The big question(s): Why do I come to these conferences? What do I get out of them?
Being a teacher can be a lonely job. I am surrounded by students all day and rarely get to interact with my peers on a professional level (Let’s face it, most school conversations quickly devolve into bitching sessions.). Being at these conferences lets me interact more professionally. I am seen as a valued, knowledgeable colleague and treated that way. I get to talk about deeper educational issues than I do at home. At this conference in particular, I was able to not just express my personal interest in social justice issues, but share with a tableful of people who all shared that common interest. And to discuss ways of integrating these ideals into a classroom setting.
Every year I get to meet with friends from previous years and friends from a listserv I am a member of. I get to socialize and be a grown-up, no mean trick if you are the father of a rambunctious five year old. I can have some time to try to concentrate for more than a few minutes.
I get a feeling of renewal attending these events. I feel a little more charged up, a little more optimistic, a little more eager to try different ideas and approaches in the classroom.
I also regain a deeper appreciation of my wife and daughter. I love them dearly, but sometimes get so absorbed in my teaching I take them for granted. Being away from them for several days reminds me on a visceral level now much they mean to me and how much their absence hurts.
So I get some professional insights, some site work done, some socializing, and a renewed appreciation of family right before Thanksgiving. Not a bad pay back for my attendance.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
A Brief Digression
I went all off my plans today. I had to. Most of the students I teach are African American. Last night, for the first time, an African American was elected President of the United States.
When I was five years old my mother sat me down in front of our tiny little black and white TV. Even though I wanted to out and play, she wouldn’t let me. She told me to sit there and watch what was going on. It was important; it was historic. That’s why I still have memories of seeing Neil Armstrong bouncing around up on the moon. My mother knew history was being made and wanted me to be a witness to it.
In 1990 I was up in the middle of the night aimlessly flipping through the channels when I stopped on CNN. They were reporting live about an unprovoked attack on a country named Kuwait by the dictator Saddam Hussein of Iraq. Even then I had a premonition of doom. This premonition was made reality a few months later as I was again watching CNN and watched the bombing of Baghdad. Listening to the three reporters in that hotel room I again knew that I was watching a history changing event.
It is so rare in our lives that we see something of truly historic importance. It is even more rare when we realize at the time it is occurring that the event is that huge and important. Last night, as I watched the election returns come in and Barack Obama make a steady march from three electoral votes to over 300 electoral votes, I again knew this was a reality changer. Our country had crossed a threshold it could never uncross. We had elected an African American to the highest office of our land.
So today I showed them the video of President-Elect Obama’s victory speech.
I talked about history and the importance of history. And I told my students to write what they thought about this event and how they felt about it. I let them know it was not going to be published. It was more personal than that. I gave them a chance to share in small groups or pairs if they wanted to. Two of my classes were noticeably quiet after that announcement.
After they had finished I gave each student an envelope. I told them to write their names and something about what was inside (Election 08, Obama Wins, etc.) and to put the letter inside the envelope. In each class several wanted to know if they were to lick the envelope. It was up to them. I finished by telling them to take it home and put it somewhere safe. That in 10 or 20 years it would be very meaningful to them. If they ever have kids or grandkids ask them about this historic day, they can pull out what they wrote today.
I thought this digression was well worth it.
When I was five years old my mother sat me down in front of our tiny little black and white TV. Even though I wanted to out and play, she wouldn’t let me. She told me to sit there and watch what was going on. It was important; it was historic. That’s why I still have memories of seeing Neil Armstrong bouncing around up on the moon. My mother knew history was being made and wanted me to be a witness to it.
In 1990 I was up in the middle of the night aimlessly flipping through the channels when I stopped on CNN. They were reporting live about an unprovoked attack on a country named Kuwait by the dictator Saddam Hussein of Iraq. Even then I had a premonition of doom. This premonition was made reality a few months later as I was again watching CNN and watched the bombing of Baghdad. Listening to the three reporters in that hotel room I again knew that I was watching a history changing event.
It is so rare in our lives that we see something of truly historic importance. It is even more rare when we realize at the time it is occurring that the event is that huge and important. Last night, as I watched the election returns come in and Barack Obama make a steady march from three electoral votes to over 300 electoral votes, I again knew this was a reality changer. Our country had crossed a threshold it could never uncross. We had elected an African American to the highest office of our land.
So today I showed them the video of President-Elect Obama’s victory speech.
I talked about history and the importance of history. And I told my students to write what they thought about this event and how they felt about it. I let them know it was not going to be published. It was more personal than that. I gave them a chance to share in small groups or pairs if they wanted to. Two of my classes were noticeably quiet after that announcement.
After they had finished I gave each student an envelope. I told them to write their names and something about what was inside (Election 08, Obama Wins, etc.) and to put the letter inside the envelope. In each class several wanted to know if they were to lick the envelope. It was up to them. I finished by telling them to take it home and put it somewhere safe. That in 10 or 20 years it would be very meaningful to them. If they ever have kids or grandkids ask them about this historic day, they can pull out what they wrote today.
I thought this digression was well worth it.
Monday, October 27, 2008
My Inspiration
I was asked recently about my inspiration to become a teacher. I had previously written a piece on that. So, here it is. The way I was inspired to teach...
I came to be a teacher from a different direction than a most educators I know. Most of my colleagues can point to an influential teacher who was so wonderful, so marvelous, that they were inspired to be like that person. Not me. (Okay, in later years I had many a teacher whose good example I sought to emulate--but this essay is going back to the first cause.)
It was not a particularly good teacher that inspired me to teach, but a particularly bad teacher. At least from my perspective. Mrs. Brown, my fifth grade teacher, seemed to me to be about 90 years older than God. She was petite, barely over five feet tall. And I was completely terrified of her. Her strong Southern accent was a novelty for me. Her hostile attitude was like nothing I had ever encountered before.
I remember one time near the end of the school year in particular. I was the most naive, gullible dupe. Several of the students in the class, who had been picking on me unmercifully for months, had decided on a new strategy to get to me. Throughout the day they fed me the story, over and over, that there was going to be a big racial fight after school. Different people mentioned it to me at different times. Some allowed me to overhear them talking with each other about it.
It was in South Florida in the 70s. It was possible, even in fifth grade I knew that. And I was scared. Scared for myself, especially after one girl, new to the school, told me with absolute sincerity that I was a target for the black kids (she used a racial epithet here). I was more scared for my brother, he was a kindergartner in the same school. By the end of the day, I was a wreck. I sat in my desk, sobbing with anxiety.
She asked me what was wrong and I told her about the fight to come. She laughed and told me that was ridiculous. There was no such thing gonna happen. Then she said, and I remember this clearly, “And now need the whole class to sit here laughin’ at you.” They complied. No empathy. No concern. No offer of any kind of understanding. That is the first time I can remember an adult being intentionally cruel to me.
She had her mind set on the way teaching and learning were supposed to happen and anything--or anyone--differing from that preconceived notion was wrong. I guess that made me wrong. For the first time I was not doing well in school. I was getting more quiet and withdrawn. I was called in to see the counselor, who gave me some tests. Being the good little schnook that I was, I took them without a thought as to why. I was “diagnosed” as being gifted. I say diagnosed because the school system seemed determined to cure me.
I was placed in a pull out program. Twice a week I was removed from Mrs. Brown's class to work with the special education, gifted and talented class. This seemed to infuriate Mrs. Brown. I think she felt highly insulted that she was not deemed to be “good enough” to teach me. As I was not making stellar grades in her class to begin with, she could not understand why I was being put in the special ed class. After all, if I was so “gifted,” shouldn’t I be passing her classes?
She failed me for the work I missed in her class. She would only grudgingly, if at all, help me catch up on the work I missed, after all, I was "gifted," right? I should be able to catch up without her help. She never missed a chance to scorn my work publicly and to hold up the work of other students not in the special ed program as examples of work as markedly superior to whatever I turned in.
The students in the class picked up on her attitude. They began to call me names. Poke me. My school supplies would disappear. I was cut off from their society. It was not enough that I was new to the school. Not enough that I was shy and bookish. The teacher was against me. As the year progressed, it got worse and worse right up to the racial fight hoax.
I do not think she could have failed to notice what was going on, but she never attempted to put a stop to it. I don’t know, maybe she thought she was toughening me up or something equally silly. As a teacher myself, I am appalled by her behavior.
When my parents complained about her to the principal, they were told, in essence, “It's her last year; we don't want to make any trouble for her.” Although not particularly surprised by it, I am even more appalled by this attitude on the part of the administration. Schools do not exist for teachers, but for students. Worrying about trouble for her was not what their focus should have been. Worrying about what she was doing to students should have been what they were most concerned about.
Their idea was to come up with a compromise, they offered to move me to another fifth grade classroom. For some reason, the decision was left by the administration to my parents, and by my parents to me. Remember, I was a fifth grader and they were adults. I have always been too stubborn for my own good. Apparently I was very persuasive when I elected to stay in her class. I was not moved. And after that I lost any recourse of going to the office, as I had rejected their solution. I felt even more isolated and cut off after that.
Why would I stay there, though? Why wouldn’t I get out when I could? For some time I felt it was because I was too stubborn to leave. If she didn't like me the worst thing I could do was stay there in her face. I think the more honest answer was that I had one really good friend in the school, from my perspective at the time one really good friend in the whole world, and Jack was in that class. I had always had trouble making friends. I was afraid that if I left I would never make another friend and that was scarier than anything the teacher could do to me.
Often as I sat there I thought that anyone could be a better teacher than she was, even me. There was my spark. As I progressed in school I had teachers who made a deeper positive impression in me, but it was Mrs. Brown in fifth grade who started me off on my current path. Without her I might have never been inspired to teach.
I came to be a teacher from a different direction than a most educators I know. Most of my colleagues can point to an influential teacher who was so wonderful, so marvelous, that they were inspired to be like that person. Not me. (Okay, in later years I had many a teacher whose good example I sought to emulate--but this essay is going back to the first cause.)
It was not a particularly good teacher that inspired me to teach, but a particularly bad teacher. At least from my perspective. Mrs. Brown, my fifth grade teacher, seemed to me to be about 90 years older than God. She was petite, barely over five feet tall. And I was completely terrified of her. Her strong Southern accent was a novelty for me. Her hostile attitude was like nothing I had ever encountered before.
I remember one time near the end of the school year in particular. I was the most naive, gullible dupe. Several of the students in the class, who had been picking on me unmercifully for months, had decided on a new strategy to get to me. Throughout the day they fed me the story, over and over, that there was going to be a big racial fight after school. Different people mentioned it to me at different times. Some allowed me to overhear them talking with each other about it.
It was in South Florida in the 70s. It was possible, even in fifth grade I knew that. And I was scared. Scared for myself, especially after one girl, new to the school, told me with absolute sincerity that I was a target for the black kids (she used a racial epithet here). I was more scared for my brother, he was a kindergartner in the same school. By the end of the day, I was a wreck. I sat in my desk, sobbing with anxiety.
She asked me what was wrong and I told her about the fight to come. She laughed and told me that was ridiculous. There was no such thing gonna happen. Then she said, and I remember this clearly, “And now need the whole class to sit here laughin’ at you.” They complied. No empathy. No concern. No offer of any kind of understanding. That is the first time I can remember an adult being intentionally cruel to me.
She had her mind set on the way teaching and learning were supposed to happen and anything--or anyone--differing from that preconceived notion was wrong. I guess that made me wrong. For the first time I was not doing well in school. I was getting more quiet and withdrawn. I was called in to see the counselor, who gave me some tests. Being the good little schnook that I was, I took them without a thought as to why. I was “diagnosed” as being gifted. I say diagnosed because the school system seemed determined to cure me.
I was placed in a pull out program. Twice a week I was removed from Mrs. Brown's class to work with the special education, gifted and talented class. This seemed to infuriate Mrs. Brown. I think she felt highly insulted that she was not deemed to be “good enough” to teach me. As I was not making stellar grades in her class to begin with, she could not understand why I was being put in the special ed class. After all, if I was so “gifted,” shouldn’t I be passing her classes?
She failed me for the work I missed in her class. She would only grudgingly, if at all, help me catch up on the work I missed, after all, I was "gifted," right? I should be able to catch up without her help. She never missed a chance to scorn my work publicly and to hold up the work of other students not in the special ed program as examples of work as markedly superior to whatever I turned in.
The students in the class picked up on her attitude. They began to call me names. Poke me. My school supplies would disappear. I was cut off from their society. It was not enough that I was new to the school. Not enough that I was shy and bookish. The teacher was against me. As the year progressed, it got worse and worse right up to the racial fight hoax.
I do not think she could have failed to notice what was going on, but she never attempted to put a stop to it. I don’t know, maybe she thought she was toughening me up or something equally silly. As a teacher myself, I am appalled by her behavior.
When my parents complained about her to the principal, they were told, in essence, “It's her last year; we don't want to make any trouble for her.” Although not particularly surprised by it, I am even more appalled by this attitude on the part of the administration. Schools do not exist for teachers, but for students. Worrying about trouble for her was not what their focus should have been. Worrying about what she was doing to students should have been what they were most concerned about.
Their idea was to come up with a compromise, they offered to move me to another fifth grade classroom. For some reason, the decision was left by the administration to my parents, and by my parents to me. Remember, I was a fifth grader and they were adults. I have always been too stubborn for my own good. Apparently I was very persuasive when I elected to stay in her class. I was not moved. And after that I lost any recourse of going to the office, as I had rejected their solution. I felt even more isolated and cut off after that.
Why would I stay there, though? Why wouldn’t I get out when I could? For some time I felt it was because I was too stubborn to leave. If she didn't like me the worst thing I could do was stay there in her face. I think the more honest answer was that I had one really good friend in the school, from my perspective at the time one really good friend in the whole world, and Jack was in that class. I had always had trouble making friends. I was afraid that if I left I would never make another friend and that was scarier than anything the teacher could do to me.
Often as I sat there I thought that anyone could be a better teacher than she was, even me. There was my spark. As I progressed in school I had teachers who made a deeper positive impression in me, but it was Mrs. Brown in fifth grade who started me off on my current path. Without her I might have never been inspired to teach.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Less Than Heroic
I am back from my wonderfully short, but still beloved, fall break. My school system takes a couple of days off after the first semester ends. This year it was Monday and Tuesday for the teachers and students, and Wednesday for the students—teachers had an inservice day. It is a nice break in the middle of the semester.
Usually.
It seems my body knows when I am about to get a chance to relax and sees that as an opportunity to break down. Sure enough I woke up Sunday with a raging headache and a feeling of extreme fatigue. This kept up all day. Monday I wasn’t any better. I got worse. At a clinic Monday night I almost passed out before being violently ill. I was given two IV bags of fluids, some meds, and told not to drive myself home.
Tuesday was much the same.
By yesterday I was almost feeling human and was able to eat and keep down some solid food. I did not make the inservice day.
I am not at 100% yet. I am able to show up at work and try to do my job. My students are going to be working on putting together a movie review in here today and tomorrow. Logically, then, it follows that they need to see a movie in order to do so. So we are watching Spider-Man. It is not the best use of class time, but I need to have them doing something that requires a minimal physical functioning from me.
Besides, it is a two day week. Not enough time to start anything heavy. And heck, they deserve a rest now and then, too.
Is this my proudest moment as a teacher? No, not really. Then why blog about this to the whole few people who read this? Because sometimes this is what happens in a classroom. Sometimes the teacher is not at 100%. That is a part of the way it is. And if I only blog about the things I do well, or the things going on that tick me off, I am not being as honest as I think I should be.
So, I hope to be back at a higher level by Monday. Until then…
Usually.
It seems my body knows when I am about to get a chance to relax and sees that as an opportunity to break down. Sure enough I woke up Sunday with a raging headache and a feeling of extreme fatigue. This kept up all day. Monday I wasn’t any better. I got worse. At a clinic Monday night I almost passed out before being violently ill. I was given two IV bags of fluids, some meds, and told not to drive myself home.
Tuesday was much the same.
By yesterday I was almost feeling human and was able to eat and keep down some solid food. I did not make the inservice day.
I am not at 100% yet. I am able to show up at work and try to do my job. My students are going to be working on putting together a movie review in here today and tomorrow. Logically, then, it follows that they need to see a movie in order to do so. So we are watching Spider-Man. It is not the best use of class time, but I need to have them doing something that requires a minimal physical functioning from me.
Besides, it is a two day week. Not enough time to start anything heavy. And heck, they deserve a rest now and then, too.
Is this my proudest moment as a teacher? No, not really. Then why blog about this to the whole few people who read this? Because sometimes this is what happens in a classroom. Sometimes the teacher is not at 100%. That is a part of the way it is. And if I only blog about the things I do well, or the things going on that tick me off, I am not being as honest as I think I should be.
So, I hope to be back at a higher level by Monday. Until then…
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Creating Fun Ways to Study Vocabulary
I have found some cool new sites to help me get my students ready for the vocabulary I teach them. I go with the idea of teaching them Greek and Latin root words. And I start with numerical prefixes. A great big shout out to Ted Nellen for originating this idea and turning me on to it about ten years ago or so.
Classtools.net is the first site I like. I used it to create these two games.
I also used Pro Profs to create this stack of flash cards to help my students study.
I have felt the need to give my students these kinds of tools in order to get them to study. I am hoping that if I make the studying a bit more fun they will focus more on it.
These are all on my website for the students.
What do you think of these games?
Classtools.net is the first site I like. I used it to create these two games.
Click here for full screen version
Click here for full screen version
I also used Pro Profs to create this stack of flash cards to help my students study.
Powered By ProProfs: Create Flashcards
I have felt the need to give my students these kinds of tools in order to get them to study. I am hoping that if I make the studying a bit more fun they will focus more on it.
These are all on my website for the students.
What do you think of these games?
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