Field Notes 1/24/14

There are no field notes for the debriefing session held yesterday with a group of seven middle school teachers and one administrator. The graduate assistant, who records hours of what is said in mentor lessons and the debriefings that follow, was back in the classroom delivering the lesson so that the host teacher could sit in with the group. We forgot to turn on the mike that would record our session, and we failed to get exit slips. No typist, no recording, no exit slips.

Just as well. This retelling will be quite enough honesty for me. I'm glad I won't have to reread a transcript of the session. These field notes are written following a night of reflection.

I"ll follow three threads here: the opposing filters through which we view these lessons, problems posed by the lack of a common vocabulary, and our delivery system.

Monthly, we step into a host classroom to deliver a lesson; we do our best to tailor the lesson to the host teacher's curriculum. We hire substitute teachers so that the other teachers in our program of professional development can step into the classroom to observe. Observations are followed by a group discussion which is supposed to be guided by some questions we have carefully considered. We are trying to create a model of observations followed by conversation which can be sustained by the school after we leave.

Yesterday's lesson was derailed by a lack of common vocabulary. I was to be in a social studies teacher's classroom. He is a model teacher in that he sees himself as a teacher of writing; he embeds extended writing assignments into his units. He has welcomed our help since he has to read 140 student essays, and he wants to read interesting, engaging lessons. We arranged for me to step in after students had done a first draft of a retelling of the Boston Massacre with a required 25 sentences, ten facts, and five uses of propaganda. Most of the pieces were drafted as first person narratives from the point of view of a Loyalist.

I prepared a lesson designed to help students understand the power of revision to "give them something to say" rather than "having to say something." (Thanks, John Dewey.) Students did three five minute rewrites of their drafts changing the point of view, genre, and audience. The student writing, shared with me on Google.docs, was crisp and entertaining and peppered with the required facts and propaganda. They offered clear possibilities for revision.

However, I had known my lesson would be problematic even before I left for the school. I had gone online to check homework for these students and learned that they had been writing for four days on this project and were required to have been finished the day before I arrived. The host teacher's concept of a first draft was a paper that was finished except for editing, as opposed to my idea of first drafts which are messy first runs. I was stepping into his classroom at the wrong time, confirmed by the student who volunteered the comment, "I wish you were here when we started writing!"

I certainly wish I had picked up on our different stances on first drafts in our back and forth email conversations, but at that point the lesson wasn't entirely off the tracks. A perceptive teacher noticed how much the radical revisions related to RAFT prompts: role (point of view), audience, format (genre), and task (retell the Boston Massacre.) We could have pursued this in debriefing as a way for the content area teachers to adapt this lesson and left the session with some positive vibes.

However, the protocol questions for debriefing were abandoned. In the time for clarifying questions, a content area teacher asked me if I expected her to teach this lesson in her classroom. I think she went on to give reasons why she couldn't. A yes or no question, certainly, but I slipped into awkward defenses and justifications. I was painfully aware that I lack the necessary skill to redirect the conversation. A team builder at the beginning of every debriefing and another look at our protocol are in order. We clearly don't have the model for a classroom teacher to sit where I sat yesterday. I wouldn't want any teacher to feel bruised and battered.

I saw yesterday's lesson through the filter of belief that I should be teaching students directly. I make it a point to leave the classroom with student writing in hand, demonstrating that almost all students have something to say and will say something. There's nothing wrong with that if I were the classroom teacher. But the teachers at yesterday's school have been repeatedly asking me to deliver lessons that speak to the teachers--very specific, targeted lessons that they can use themselves. How ironic! I deliver a lesson in revision, and these teachers ask me to re-vision, look again, at the way I deliver my own lessons.

Our conversation with the principal following the debriefing gives me a vision for a different form of delivery. After all, we are here to make decisions about what innovative professional development delivery looks like. The principal had been considering ideas to get all teachers on board with increasing writing in their classrooms, but he was concerned his current ideas were too rigid. He spoke of requiring his teachers to try one Write to Learn strategy per week and visiting about the implementation of the strategy in the collaborative teams that have been established at his school. He would like to see discussion of what good responses look like. We left the conversation with our offer to provide such strategies weekly, with specific ideas for the teachers we serve. It is possible for us to check homework online so we can offer a RAFT idea to the teacher studying skeletal systems or the Boston Massacre, admit slip ideas for the teacher studying Japanese internment. The mentor lesson could feature a teacher using one of the strategies, the debriefing could focus on the implementation of the strategies.

It's not easy to move from classroom teacher mode to thinking partner mode. It is not easy to change my concept of professional development from one of the expert drops in one time to one of I"m here to listen to you. I am extremely grateful that the team is bringing our trainer back on board. I began this blog post thinking that I had failed the program, but am a little gentler on myself here at its close. I'm making missteps, but I'm paying attention.

Zentangling Will Heal Me

And today, another very personal post as I try to figure out how I subverted my hopes of blissful retirement and stepped into another job where I work far too much. I currently have the perfect job for which I'm well suited, but I still haven't learned to set boundaries for my work hours. I was up at five again this morning to start writing and expect to be on the job most of the day when I am only supposed to be working part-time.

Previously, my extended working hours as a Middle School English teacher gave me a place to hide from a family member's alcoholism. But he is in recovery now, and my retirement poem speaks of wanting to restore a marriage, spoil a grandchild, and plant gardens. I am afraid I am becoming increasingly unavailable, consumed by another job I find fascinating.

There is most certainly a happy balance; I've seen it in the lives of women I admire. In the past, writing has served me well in helping me arrive at solutions. Let's see what happens here.

I am paid by the job. I deliver professional development (PD) sessions and demonstrate lessons in the classroom, for which I am paid enough that I am afforded some bragging rights. But we have missed some PD sessions due to inclement weather; my co-facilitator and I were instructed to make up those sessions by offering to meet individually with the teachers we serve. These instructions opened the floodgates of possibilities since I had already been moving in the direction of individual planning conferences with teachers we serve.

(I wrote a long list here, but it doesn't serve any useful purpose except make me tired!)

I'm pretty certain that although accolades for our work are nice, I am not doing this for pats on the back. I have been paying attention to the adrenaline rush I get from discovering something new. That's what I'm addicted to. I'm equally addicted to zentangling, the art of meditative doodling and would like to pursue it further, but I'm caught in the quagmire of having over-committed to my teachers. I am hoping that detailing the commitments will allow me to look at them as a whole, following through on all of the current commitments, but offering a glimpse of what I can commit to with ease.

It won't be easy for me to let go of workaholism. You should see have seen my father, who measured his worth by his accomplishments achieved through unending labor. I have spent a lot of time writing about how his measure of success has shaped my life in ways that make me feel deeply flawed.

I am asking my primary reader of this blog post to be the lovely woman who trained us to deliver world class professional development. We meet with her today; I am anxious for her wisdom and counsel.

Oh, I am weary! I think a session of Zentangling will do me a world of good!

And how has this conversation helped you?

My daughter called the other morning, breathless with excitement over a brain-awakening treatment she'd just had. She had prepared me for her call by asking me to read about this New Age treatment. A promise that you can teach the parts of your brain to speak to each other and overcome chronic pain and depression would be greeted with skepticism by many, but ever since my daughter was a toddler, I've been telling doctors, and anyone who would listen, "There's something wrong with her brain!" I am very receptive to such treatment. (More background: When I was a young mother, I eased my children's pain from childhood illness by smoothing their auras. I recently treated a bout of flu with homeopathic remedies and recovered quickly. I do not discount Western medicine, but I turn first to alternative treatments.)

I noted in her baby book that G- was born screaming, and still today she erupts in violent fits of anger that are seemingly unprovoked and most certainly out of her control. When the brain practitioner, without any previous conversation, used her technology to identify my daughter's issues accurately, my daughter was sold and signed up for an intensive week of treatment.

The brain guru also told G- she had black and white thinking, incapable of seeing the gray areas we all operate in. We, her family, have been aware of that thinking for years so it was no surprise that she had made an appointment with a naturopath for the same day--let's get everything fixed now!--and it was no surprise that she called after that appointment to say she was anxious and uncertain. She also was determined to quit all her medications at once cold turkey, when in the morning she was entertaining the idea of reduced dosages.

Time for a coaching conversation. Could I steer her toward a balanced path by letting her do all the thinking? Could I take the training I have received for working with teachers and apply it to a conversation with someone I love dearly? After all, the results of an attempted conversation with my husband were fodder for comedy. But I rephrased her statements and gave them back to her, accompanied by questions designed to push her toward success. And as we spoke, I sensed the tension lift from her. She decided on some small steps.

And even though I thought it might feel a little stilted and awkward to ask the closing coaching question, I asked anyway. "How has this conversation helped you?" I had never dared to ask before, never dared to believe that anything I said could possibly have helped, but I think she was smiling broadly when she replied, "Oh, Mom, it's helped a lot. I love you."

I love you too, Dear Daughter.

Reflecting on My Role in CRWP

It's time for an end of the semester, beginning of a new semester, reflection. I've reread my August post and was reminded of the trepidation I felt as I began the job of a facilitator for a program of professional development. I have relaxed into the role and approach every new task with a fair degree of comfort.

Research and reflection. Our greatest contributions. I had sufficient time for neither when I was a classroom teacher. Our cutting-edge professional development supports teachers with research to guide their practices. Teachers will soon be delivering their own lessons, with their colleagues watching them, but until then I get to teach lessons to students and watch what happens when we use research-supported writing practices. My latest lesson taught students how to use a text structure for literary analysis; I spent hours studying how other people wrote about literature and paid attention to the structure they used.

And reflection. Heather and I coach group conversations, with teachers across grade levels, following each lesson. How many schools offer time for purposeful conversation focused solely on the research and strategies guiding a lesson--with no talk of chaperoning the school dance or scheduling time in the computer lab thrown in? Conversations in the past two days focused on strategies to make students feel successful and how to write answers on constructed response items that prepare students for college, career, and citizenship.

How have I grown personally? Well, I've certainly found the place where I can do what I love to do which is to think about best practices and create lessons around them, and I get to teach just often enough to satisfy my pleasure in being with students. I'm not gregarious enough to feel completely confident in front of a large group of teachers, but I've grown to feel competent enough.

I will admit to being too focused on content with not enough attention given to the people, teachers and students, using it. It is with a great deal of surprise and pleasure that I notice I am becoming more people oriented. I give credit to sessions in coaching people to think. I've been taught how to craft questions so the person I'm coaching does all the thinking, freeing me to concentrate on fully listening to my conversation partner. My lessons in listening are carrying over to casual conversations as well.

As I begin the second semester, my biggest concern is in managing my time. I likely am doing too much. My mind races when a teacher admits that behavior management keeps her from using small groups in the classroom or when a teacher feels pushed to use isolated instruction in grammar. I want to offer a lesson!

I am an occasional blogger, not disciplined enough to do it every day. However, the benefits of reflecting in a blog or a journal are enormous; I encourage you to find a method for reflection too. Together we can watch ourselves grow.

College, Career, and Citizenship

Yesterday I taught a lesson on literary analysis to a group of 8th graders in a rural school; I asked them to defend a claim with evidence from a story they had read. One young man, with only a minor degree of belligerence since, after all, I was a guest, said he wasn't going to ever use it, wasn't ever going to write in his career. I was pulled in by his statement and sputtered something about him needing to learn how to craft an argument for his use as an adult. I didn't really believe in my response myself; however, I was absolutely convinced that learning how to support a claim was a skill I wanted all students to master.

I pondered what I said to the student on my long drive home, and it occurred to me that even if he feels no obligation to himself or some future family members, he still has an obligation to society. We are not preparing students just for college and career, we are preparing them for citizenship as well. I borrow the third "C" from Wilhelm, Smith, and Fredricksen in Get It Done!: Writing and Analyzing Informational Texts to Make Things Happen. I share the authors' belief that our lessons in literary analysis, text structure, making claims--"rigorous apprenticeship into disciplinary thinking (8)"--should prepare students for citizenship as well.

I'll have to spend some time developing the support for my claim. What can I say to a jaded 8th grader to convince him to care about me or citizens of another country? I certainly wish I had thought of this yesterday in the debriefing session where nine teachers gather to discuss their observations. (It's a rare opportunity to have time for teachers to weigh in on important topics.) A group conversation could have helped me craft my argument.

I'll work on it because I'm determined to never again respond with an indefensible "Oh, yes, you will" to a student with the bravado to tell me "Oh, but I won't!" Students deserve a thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a topic worthy of consideration.

What are our responsibilities as teachers to train students to be citizens? How does authentic audience and purpose or service learning fit into your instruction? I welcome your comments. I'm not going to forget that young man anytime soon. I don't want to have to sputter the next time he blows off an assignment.

Wilhelm, Jeffrey, Michael Smith, and James Fredricksen. Get It Done!: Writing and Analyzing Informational Texts to Make Things Happen. 2003. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

I Need to Write a Book

For several years I have been entertaining the notion of writing a book. Many times I have decided a topic is book-worthy and declared, "I should write a book." However, I haven't settled on a single topic and haven't set aside the time to write, so no book has been written. I was lamenting this fact to my colleague Rachel on a long road trip today and sharing some of my ideas with an occasional "Oh, I just remembered another book idea!" peppering our conversation. Rachel suggested I should write my ideas down as a first step in getting a book in print. Here are the ideas, in no particular order.

I am an advocate of student collaboration across grade levels. My middle school students have conversed about books with high school seniors and found the collaboration so satisfying that we did something similar for students in fifth grade. My students created math trails for second graders and helped kindergartners identify coins and count things. My students read to preschoolers. They responded as Secret Santas to the Santa letters of first-graders. They wrote creative pieces with anti-drug messages and the high school drama students performed them for the annual DARE program. Finally, my students have conversed with adult mentors who personally encouraged them to go on to college and careers.

I enjoyed using I and fun activities to enhance learning. A doctor puppet was Dr. Grammar who introduced episodes of Grammar Hospital where the staff takes apart sentences to identify their parts. A bloodied rubber hand was the "helping hand" I could offer students when they needed help. This idea is the closest I have come to writing a book with many ideas already written down; however, I need a tighter structure.

My Al-anon sponsor is an English teacher so I had to write my way through the twelve steps. I ended up inserting a lot of my poems into the narrative so I have a memoir of sorts. A Poet Writes Her Way Through the Twelve Steps

I have introduced women in Al-anon to writing poetry, and they act as if it has been lifesaving with a core group returning bi-monthly to write poetry. I could create a book of exercises.

Lately I have been collecting books on art journaling, but I haven't found any books that are directed to teachers for use with their students. I am collaborating with an artist to create a workshop on the topic. We might as well write a book too.

Now that I've written the list, I'm not quite sure how I feel about it. Exhausted and too overwhelmed by the enormity of the project to even begin or energized and enthusiastic that the list is at least something of a beginning. One day at a time, one page at a time.