Speaker

Dr. Mike Schmoker spoke at our Thursday inservice session.

He stressed "Results Now." Given the high stakes testing craze our country is embroiled in, you can see why he was brought in.

And that is exactly what Schmoker preached - raising test scores. I can't tell you how many times that phrase, "test scores," was mentioned. I know it was mentioned more than "students," "engagement," "joy of learning," and "fun" were.

Don't get me wrong - he had some interesting ideas.

The first is to chuck worksheets. I totally agree. I don't have the data, but I am willing to bet that if you were to do a serious study of worksheets (why they are assigned, how serious students take them, and their overall impact on learning), you would find that a majority of them (90 percent?) are simply busy work.

When I read an article by Alfi Kohn last year in Ed Digest, I realized I had to cut back on worksheets - which made up a good portion of my homework assignments. Kohn's point was that if the students don't see the work as important and relevant, then is it really important and relevant?

I used to hammer my poor students with grammar and vocab worksheets. Then it hit me: these teach them little. Chuck the worksheets and teach grammar and vocab in context. That has a greater effect. I recall one of my favorite writers, Jack, just killing on the grammar worksheets, but when it came to writing a complete sentence, he was lost. That's because I had trained him to identify the parts of speech using someone elses writing totally out of context. Outside of school, when is a real writer ever asked to complete a grammar worksheet? It was obvious that I needed to train Jack how to write coherently, not fill out worksheets.

I could also relate to this after having helped KoKo night after night with science homework. She finished elaborate worksheets devised by the textbook company that involved unscrambling letters and fill in the blank and true and false. None of it, though, made the subject matter either important or relevant to her. The work was just something she had to get through before watching TV or going on facebook.

Is this what her teacher wanted?

I couldn't help but think of the worksheets and reading guides I had sent home for To Kill a Mockingbird.

My God! I thought, what have I just done. Did I reduce this phenomenally moving and relevant novel to just a series of tasks to finish?

I knew I had to change that. I got students creating projects related to the novel and writing more about the novel.

So I like what Schmoker had to say about the worksheets.

He also attacked other areas of busy work - movies, projects, and coloring and taping. Now when this is done mindlessly, it is a waste. But when it is done with the intent to analyze and interpret, then it's vital.

I plan on having students create their own collages that reflect their versions of the American Dream. I'm not doing it to keep them busy or take a few minutes off. We fully intend to analyze, discuss, and write about these collages.

Isn't one of the top aims of Bloom's Taxonomy to create?

But his overall message of Professional Learning Communities and developing guaranteed and proven curriculum worries me.

I love the idea of PLCs and getting teachers together to talk shop and examine what they do and develop lesson plans. That is what we should do more of.

But I just don't believe in a guaranteed or fool proof lesson plan for all teachers.

I think administrators, politicians, and education experts (and what the hell are those anyway?) want lesson plans that anyone - even, God forbid, a teacher could pull off. But that is just not feasible.

And as my neighbor added when I saw him today - what about small schools? When you have two teachers to an entire department, what kind of learning community can you create?

I think, though, that Schmoker did hit the nail on the head a couple of times. I like what he had to say about the amount of "curriculum chaos in our English and Language Arts programs."

I agree. I am one responsible for the chaos. Oftentimes my curriculum is all over the place, but that is not done out of laziness or lack of planning. It is done because I often need to tailor my lessons to each individual class.

Anyone who has taught will tell you that what works for one class, might not work with another.

I recall about 8 years ago I killed with a lesson on "Harlem" by Langston Hughes. We had great discussions while students analyzed verbally Hughes' series of rhetorical questions and applied reader response theory to it. It was one of my top teaching moments.

When I tried it the next block, it tanked. No discussion. Little analysis and little application of theory. So much for quarantined curriculum.

The same was true last year when I tried to analyze voice and humor in writing when I used the great David Sedaris essay "The Youth in Asia."

As we listened to it and discussed it, I saw that the class was not getting his humor. It was ugly. It bombed.

I was reluctant to try it with another class a semester later. But I had a couple writers who used sarcasm and self deprecation much like Sedaris. So I took a leap of face and we listened to the essay again. This time it killed. Students were laughing and we analyzed via discussion his use of humor for effect and how his voice impacted that.

No way to quarante that lesson.

The trick to teaching - as I see it - and what no speaker I have ever heard has ever addressed - is getting to know each of your students. Then you have to get to know how they interact as a whole class. Then you have to know how to motivate them and engage them.

That is why teaching is so damn difficult . . . and rewarding.