Back in the Title 1 Classroom

What is the plot/characterization significance of Mercutio’s Queen Mab speech?
Is there some deep value to fairy talk I’m not getting?
*Our set character predisposes our individualized reaction to the same
stimuli?*

I could be all kinds a wrong on this.
*Grimace*

Jesus Christ, the kids had a blast with Reader’s Theater. My dude was shouting ‘whore’ at the top of his lungs in class a la Mercutio. We mourned his death.

Into dystopia for the rest of the year. ‘Harrison Bergeron’ has been an incredible experience. I think they’ve been more pulled in to the totalitarian elements of this story than the setting of any previous short story we’ve read.

Fun Socratic Seminars on this!❤️

Thinking of ‘The Veldt’ next. I’d never read it before last week. Nice contrast of dystopian setting...

I was watching some of the episodes in the Love, Death & Robots animated series that was launched on Netflix recently -- and it's important to know here that each episode was made by different people and they are *drastically* different from each other, and a couple of them are quite deeply problematic and very much 18+. But there is also a couple of episodes that are basically short, low-key amusing and light-hearted, even kind of sweet takes on our dystopian robot future: "When The Yogurt Takes Over", and "Three Robots". The "Ice Age" episode kind of goes with that territory too.

Thank you!!

I also need to check out some episodes of Black Mirror (if could be construed as safe for PG audiences...)

Yeah, my gf started to look into Black Mirror episodes in the hope she might be able to use some for her classes, but.... the PG thing looms large ;-)

So I know my kids are as intelligent as the kids in the wealthier neighborhoods; that’s why I want to teach them specifically. I know poor kids are underserved—period. They score low on standardized tests, and the district, the community, and THEY define them by these scores.

I was bummed as **** by ultra low scores last time, so one day, I pulled my chair out into the front of the class and asked them what would compel them to really try on one of these big tests.

One kid says ‘a PlayStation party’ would be enough for him. This was a way above average kid who is just checked out academically. I ran with it, got the other teachers on board, admin approval, and now it’s a big deal.

The school is sorta agog at 40+, 30+ point increases across the board, but frankly can I say here—**** admin—the KIDS are telling everybody who’ll listen about their increases. I’m in ******* hog heaven.

I wrote their names and the precise numbers of their increases on posters and taped them up in the hall. I felt like an idiot doing it because our student population would be expected by any sane adult to tear down anything on the wall immediately—but crowds gathered around it all day between classes and talked about it. I feel like we’ve made academic achievement sexy, and I am over the moon.

The growth is astonishing. The kids are buzzing. I am floating.

Good teacher day.

Dys would say: Good on ya.

That's amazing. High-fives to both the students and you yourself.

Dumb question, how old are the kids in your class? I've never really grasped the concept of middle school :-)

12, 13

Per request, I stayed late yesterday, helping 2 other teachers create achievement walls like mine.

I’ve never worked with a group of educators who were all so hellbent on serving a student population.

Got some funding to make party day a little sweeter!!

My thoughts as my students immersed for a day in the context of an upcoming short story set in the 50s:

I know people throw McCarthyism around— I do—but the connection to that scourge and this unforgivable witch-hunt of Americans who dare to criticize Israel is direct and undeniable.

Pre-McCarthyism, this country had a bit more diversity of political affiliation, and McCarthyism shut that down. Malcolm, MLK, and many more Americans ascribed to communism, Democratic Socialism, several other left-leaning political philosophies—and the extreme right jailed them, allowed them to be assassinated—and used the long arm of the military industrial complex and the unrestrained capitalism it serves to wipe them away.

That power is still protecting their status quo by frightening people away from words like ‘socialism’, popular leaders like Bernie Sanders, and chasing them into the arms of familiar but increasingly lethal unrestrained capitalism.

We watched some of the hearings, and I was stricken with how the questioning seems like something no self-respecting American would allow to go unchallenged, yet our own Democrat party attacked and censured our first Muslim Congressional Representative because she dared to clap back on Israel’s barbarism against Palestinians and our culpability in that.

Am I the only one who sees this happening?

Am I the only one who sees this happening?

No

Teacher fortunes can change in a split second.

The most respected teacher (multiple awards and designations) actually flipped a screw and *yelled* at another teacher in front of about 15 students. Some of the students actually stood between them, admonishing the offender. I was really proud of them, but it’s incredibly unprofessional to subject teacher and students to that kind of mess. It goes on her professional record... as does this issue that sort of freaked me out today.

A coach called and asked me to send a female student to his office. When I asked her to, she said she didn’t feel comfortable doing that. Big red flag for me, so I wasn’t going to send her. She wanted to tell me what’d happened; it was convoluted and time-consuming and he was calling non-stop before she finished her story. Nothing sexual, but he said a few (again, not sexually) inappropriate things to her.

Ipsofacto, I’m stuck standing at my door when he finally arrives, likely pretty pissed at me now, telling him she doesn’t want to have the conversation. He says it’s mandatory per the principal... Hated being forced into that weird situation. Hope I don’t hear anything else from it. We didn’t have Drama 101 in Teacher Prep.

Interesting day. Glad it’s over.

This is really braggy, but I’m putting it here for posterity.

Two administrators approached me and told me to document the artifacts surrounding the incentive I put together for our students. The district has been asking questions about how our scores had such a noticeable jump.

While I was putting together the campaign and party, I didn’t think past seeing what the kids could actually do when they tried and letting them see. My stock just soared. Nice by-product. 🔥

What life is like for a teacher:

Teachers in SC are making moves toward forming a union.

The first steps were meeting with legislators, outlining our grievances, writing letters... They ignored us.

I’m not going to try to convince anybody about how horrific the profession has become, but I’ll tell you the number of college students opting for and entering the field has decreased dramatically and teachers are leaving in DROVES.

We have OUR FIRST sick out /call out scheduled for May 1 in a show of strength against the legislature and the school system. If you see a poor showing flashed on a TV screen, you’ll have the whole story.

Teachers are afraid to lose their jobs.

My school’s principal sent us an email, a veiled threat against our jobs.

It’s so weird. I fought against a too-powerful union in CA—and now, I face this on the other side of the country.

I’d like to see the birth of a union in SC. Will keep ppl updated.

Thanks for leaving this link here! Watched it with my girlfriend, then episode 2 as well. We did giggle a bit in the beginning at, hmm, his persona (made a mock-bet about when he would first smile), but all in all it was really interesting.

I liked his student-centred approach - they know more than people think, and improving teaching practices starts with listening to them. And I loved the ways he dissected, then disrupted, all ever so politely, the standard classroom conventions that de facto serve to flatter (but not challenge) top students, while leaving struggling students alienated and zoning out.

My girlfriend liked several of the practical strategies he had the teachers implement, and will see if she can use some of them herself too. If not in the remainder of the school year now, next year (wherever we might end up then, and assuming there'll be another job at all). She liked the calling sticks, and those are easy to implement. The cups worried her a bit more, not sure if it's because of the greater potential for a mess or because it's a little more confrontative for the teacher (poor Miss Obe...).

She liked the idea of picking students to evaluate the class and provide feedback. She already uses a slightly related technique in group work, where every student gets a role in their respective groups, including "the secretary" who is to keep notes of how the group and class discussion went. More directed at fellow students than at the teacher, but she did see the same effect: an ordinarily uninterested, underperforming student, jolted or flattered by the responsibility, took his job very seriously, scribbling away and providing a point-by-point critique afterward. She also liked the 'secret student' idea, but that would require buy-in from the school/other teachers. No money for mini-whiteboards I'm afraid.. forget what the other ideas were, it was a week or two ago that we watched it, just hadn't gotten round to coming back here and say "thanks" yet. :-)

Stop! Strike! Unionize!

I’m so glad she found it useful! I adopted the calling sticks and I found the cups too unwieldy and fodder for disruption for my large percentage of kids looking for a way to disrupt.

I meet with my kids (twice a year, so far) and ask them to critique me by answering three questions. I’ve gotten some seriously valuable insights from them —and they get to vent:

1. What can I do to be a better teacher for you specifically?
2. What is my worst habit?
3. What is one thing I’m getting right.

It feels really cool to me that you guys got ideas from Wiliam.🎈

https://youtu.be/nva8UofZ3fY
For teachers, browsing through. ‘Vice’ did a segment on Oklahoma teachers, spanning their fight with legislators.


Spoiler: teachers lost.
Watch what happens to SC teachers, starting May 1, 2019. Our first step outside the classroom.