A Shift in the Classroom

Recently, all of the 5th grade teachers of my district were assembled for a professional development meeting.  There seemed to be about 60 of us.

Back in 2011, the state of Utah quit giving pensions to teachers.  All new hires were on their own to save for their retirement years.  I was curious what effect that would have on our profession.

I found out at this meeting.

One of our activities was about data collection.  As part of the activity, all of us needed to put on the chart how many years we had been teaching.  I was shocked at the results.

I always knew that Utah's change in policy would have an effect on the longevity of folks in the teaching profession, but I didn't think it would demonstrate itself this quickly.

I was the ONLY one in the 30+ category.

There was 1 in the 20+ category.  She is a friend of mine with 29 years and will retire next year.

Everyone else was in the 15 or less category.  Most between 1-5.

I am not dissing new teachers.  I had energy and enthusiasm in my 1-5 years that was amazing... but I had no idea what I was doing.

Not only are most folks in the profession now newbies... but more and more have no training prior to entering the classroom.  Yes, my first 5 years were raw, but I had student teaching, years of internships, and class after class of child learning development and psychology.

Many teachers are being dropped into classrooms today with NONE of that.  The standard for who can be in the classroom has dropped considerably.

To be clear, I am grateful for anyone who will step up.  If you are coming from a different path and are willing to enter the classroom... welcome!

But the combination of folks untrained for the classroom, along with a loss of veterans within the field does not bode well for the profession.

I try not to allow myself to fall into conspiratorial thinking, but I cannot help but think this is part of an overall plan to dismantle public education.

If that happens, I feel this will have dire consequences for our nation. 

The Grade-Level Model

"Expensive and experienced teachers tend to be resistant to new curriculum and teaching methods."

I was on a thread where someone was making the argument that older teachers simply weren't worth keeping around.

As to the expensive part.  Yeah, nowadays I am on the top of the pay scale.  I no longer have the financial stress that I was under for decades.  Starting teacher pay is LOW, and raising a family on it is crazy.  Besides, most professional pay STARTS at what an older teacher makes.  So, I find the first point to be overstated.

But on to the more important 2nd point.  It is not that older teachers are resistant; it's that we rarely see anything that is really new.  What we don't have is that excited puppy dog reaction to the latest whoop-de-doo the district and state switch us over to every few months.  We have a sense of history.  We know that the implementation of procedure or curriculum X has more to do with job security up the line than it does with producing results in the classroom.

It is hard to do something really new in an industry that has been around for 150 years.  Our system grew out of the industrial revolution and was based on a production line model.  It was a massive improvement in a time when K-12 was being taught by a single teacher.

Want new?  I say ditch the grade level system.  Everything in our present model is designed around teaching certain concepts at a certain age.  But kids aren't widgets.  We struggle to gain ground in our system because kids are massively different.  But we keep them all on the same track.

Each year I have 2nd graders who are spread out from Clifford the Big Red Dog to Harry Potter.  I have students who are bored to tears with 2nd grade math while others wrestle with single-digit addition.  I work in a relatively homogeneous school.  Most schools in America are dealing with much wider variances.  For many students in our schools, the grade-level model is moving way too fast or much too slow.  I contend that most of our behavior issues are a result of being in a placement that does not fit.

I get what it is like to be in a place where everthing is moving too fast.  I started theater about 20 years ago in a company that focused on musicals.  I didn't know I could sing and I loved it.  I actually got to do solos!

The problem is, musicals tend to involve choreography.  If physical dyslexia is a thing, I have it.  It takes eveything in me just to remember basic blocking.  Keeping up with dozens of people dancing in a musical number?  Ouch!  I remember during one live show turning left when I was supposed to go right and ending up in a completely different group.  The guy next to me mouthed, "What are you doing here?"  I sheepishly replied that I had no idea. 🙂

Over the years, I drifted into a company that had more straight play opportunities.  But that is the thing, as an adult I had options.  Students rarely do.

Paper Law Vs Trial Law

Bad management theory is rampant in education.

There is a scene in one of the greatest movies of all time, A Few Good Men, where Demi Moore's character continues to make objections after she was overruled. Her co-counsel blows up at her after the court session-

Weinberg:

I strenuously object? Is that how it works? Objection. Overruled! No, no, no... I strenuously object! Oh, I should reconsider then!

Galloway:

I got it on the record.

Weinberg:

You got the court thinking we're afraid of the doctor. Christ, you even had the judge saying he was an expert! You object once, so we can say he's not a criminologist. You keep after it, our cross looks like a bunch of fancy lawyer tricks. It's the difference between paper law and trial law!

In education, there are too many cooks in the kitchen.  School boards, state legislatures, suits in the district office... all weighing in on how classrooms should function.  I can't tell you how many professional development sessions I have sat through over the decades where the presenter had little to no classroom experience. 

Paper law versus trial law. 

I remember reading an article when doing my grad work about a management theorist who took over a classroom to demonstrate the implementation of his theories. He gave up after a month when he realized he couldn't control the class. He still insisted his theories were valid. He just couldn't implement them.  His "trial law" experience didn't change his "paper law" outlook, so he probably went on to teach them in professional development sessions.

Too Many Cooks

Most school districts and states send down a fire hose of professional development.

Teachers are drowning in meetings, readings, data tracking, videos, and PowerPoint presentations.  And I think, from commentary I hear from teachers in other states and districts, that I deal with a fraction of what many are stacked with. 

At the start of the year, I usually have some ideas of new things I would like to try. But, invariably, all of my mental bandwidth gets sucked up into some "new" procedure or program. 

It is like you are trying to cook a turkey, but there are four other people in the kitchen who want to open the oven every 5 minutes to see if it is done.  When you tell them you have to leave the oven alone so that the turkey can cook, they heartily agree. But a few moments later, one of them gets nervous and has to open the oven again. 

There are way too many cooks in the educational kitchen.

Older Teachers

One of the hard parts of being an older teacher is to not come off as cynical.  This is difficult, because the system is set up to make you look that way.

Have you ever seen a plumbline?  It is a weight on a string. You can push it out, and it will swing back.  It can swing out anywhere in 360 degrees, but the string limits how far it will go.

The swing back and forth represents education's move from this program to that program.  For folks who have been in education less than 10 years, that swing to the 45-degree mark looks "new".  They want to give it a go, because the 100% success rate they have been longing for was not achieved in the "old" program.

This is when it is hard being an older teacher.  I have seen that swing occur three times already, but nothing positive comes from me saying that.

I remember my first staff meeting clearly.  A new program was being introduced.  The seasoned teacher beside me sighed.  She leaned over and told me this was not going to bring the results the district trumpeted.  I didn't think she might have a point; I thought, "Y'know if you are not willing to try anything new... maybe you should retire."  To me, it was a shiny new bobble!  To her, it was an old one that had been polished up.

After 34 years, I know a program... is a program.  Some are a little better, some a little worse, but none are a magic bullet.  There are too many variables.  The biggest variable is the student.

Some students have an aptitude for a subject.  They go over the math facts a few times and they are understood.  Locked and loaded.  Others struggle, but they (and/or their parents) are willing to put in the study and practice to be successful.

Then you have the third group.  They struggle... and they have little interest in putting in any effort.  For the teacher, this is like being in a three-legged race and the student lies on the ground... sometimes pulling in the opposite direction.

That isn't to say that such a student is doomed to failure in life.  They may have dozens of talents, aptitudes, and interests... they just don't fall into academic categories.  I have seen many of these kids go on to wildly successful lives.  Schools just tend to be obsessive about academics.

All that to say, as an older teacher, I just find myself smiling and nodding a lot.

We Don't "Got This"

Things changed about 25 years ago. 

During district meetings, if a teacher brought up how we should be involving the family, district folks and admin started to say -

"Well, we can't control that, so let's talk about what we can control."

It was a subtle, but tectonic shift.

On the face, there was a certain logic to it. We can't control what families do, this is true.

However, the practical upshot was that families started to interpret this as... "Don't worry about educating your child, we got this."

But we don't.  We don't got this.

Over the years, more and more kids arrived at school without foundational pieces in place.  Joey could read Dr. Seuss but Jimmy didn't even know his letters.  Sally has been read to nightly since infancy, but Sarah never experienced a book until she came to kindergarten.

Reading proficiency rates dropped like a rock through a wet paper bag.  Fingers were pointed every which way.  It was the whole-language debacle!  Phonics will fix this!  We need better instructional practices!

Every solution has been tried (repeatedly) except the most obvious one.  

America and its schools need to communicate to parents that their involvement is pivotal.  It is not optional and we will not be ok without it.

We don't "got this."  

Parents do.  

Until that is the reality we face, we will continue to rearrange chairs on the Titanic.

Marvel Zombies

Just got done watching Marvel Zombies.

Meh.

It wasn't bad...  it just wasn't... anything special.

It was indicative of what Marvel has become over the past few years.

Corporate.

Systematized.

The opposite of what DC has become since they handed the reins over to James Gunn.

Is the Gunn DC universe perfect?

No.

But it has soul.

Pursuing a perfect system is always a mistake.

It does not exist.

The best you can hope for is a creative system.

This is what is wrong with the American education system.

We want a perfect system.

It doesn't exist.

We should want a creative system.

But that means tolerating some imperfections.

That means I do one thing while someone else does another.

What works for me cannot be replicated across the entire system because people are different.

We have to be okay with diversity within the system.

I Used To Teach Sunday School

I am cleaning out my hard drives and I came across a letter I had written to my church leadership back in 2008.  I was a Sunday School teacher at the time and the Sunday School staff was going through a morning of training by a para-church organization that was dedicated to child evangelism.  I was taken aback at how aggressive the training was to get children to make professions of faith.

Reading the letter, I am struck by how obvious it is that my perspectives were going to eventually lead me out of the faith.  One simply does not find a home in conservative evangelicalism if you believe that questions and choice should be part of one's path.

It is also plain in the letter that indoctrination and, dare I say, grooming are a set component of children's ministry in such churches... which is why they are forever accusing others of the behavior.  Projection, projection, projection.

Anyway, if you are interested, here is the letter.

Dear Friends,

Let me first say that I am excited about everything we are doing with the kids in Adventure Canyon.  Mary Lee and I are grateful to be teaching the kindergarten munchkins! 

I have some concerns about what was presented this morning by the Children’s Evangelism group.  I am reluctant to bring up anything because I know, being in leadership, you are juggling enough items without me adding to them.  I know the decisions made by the leadership at Adventure Canyon are done in the best interests of our children.

As followers of Jesus, we would like to see everyone become followers of Jesus.  I believe the circumstances in which one begins that journey can be crucial to the direction it takes after the event.  When it comes to children, we have to be careful with our practices.  

This morning we heard about how one would lead a child to Christ and what that might look like.  The presentation made me uneasy.  I know, for myself, that I have no intention of leading Kathryn and Jacob down that path anytime soon.  I feel they are too young to make such a decision.  In the same way, I would not expect my 9 or 6 year old to make a decision about which career they would choose or whom they shall marry.  They could “make” such a decision, but I do not feel it would be a competent or cognizant one. I want my children to fall in love with Jesus, and as tempting as it might be for me to put them on that road, I must let them make the decision.

I know that others would hold to a different view in that regard, but that is my point.  There will be many views amongst parents about the how, why, where, and when such a thing as a decision for Christ would happen with a child.  I choose to model my Christian practices and discuss with my children why I feel the way I do concerning God.  I want them to use that as one of many perspectives when they begin to make independent steps toward God.  It would be more than a little troubling to me if an enthusiastic Sunday school teacher overstepped my intentions.  

It was brought up this morning that a teacher might feel led to lead an entire class in a sinner’s prayer.  Consider that event from an outsider’s perspective.  My family has visited our local ward on a number of occasions.  I know that my kids may hear stories from the BoM or about Joseph Smith while there in Sunday school.  I accept that.  However, I would feel completely violated if my children were to come back from Sunday school having been baptized into the Mormon faith!

I feel that we did not get a chance to process or talk about what was said this morning.  There were a dozen or so folks present and there may have been many varied interpretations of what was presented.  The spectrum could be from someone like me who would be reluctant to walk a child through a sinner’s prayer, to someone who may have intentions of a ten for ten conversion ratio by next week.

I am asking that, perhaps, we need more time as a teaching staff to talk about this before we jump in.

Happily serving the children in Adventure Canyon,

Andrew Hackman

Thanksgiving

Been thinking a lot about what I have to be thankful for as Thanksgiving approaches.

There is this scene in a Dracula mini-series that comes to mind. It is the year 2015 and Dracula has been asleep for centuries.  Upon waking, the first home he encounters is a small bungalow.  Inside he finds a woman very unhappy with her lot in life.  She has let her home fall into disrepair in her depression.  Where she sees nothing of worth, he walks through her home in fascination.  Clean water flows from the tap. A refrigerator to store food.  A shower that produces hot water in an instant.  A toilet... in the home!

She miserably shrugs off his wonderment.  He finally looks at her and says, "In my time, princes in palaces could not have imagined the luxuries afforded to you."

I was listening to a podcast yesterday where the guest was talking about how our discontent as a society stems from the comparisons that are forever presented to us on social media.  We are always being reminded of what we do not have.

So, this week I am going to remind myself to focus on the laundry list of "luxuries afforded" to me.  I'll take some time to acknowledge the wonder of a hot shower.

Belief Is Not A Virtue

Belief is tricky.  I don't think it is as simple as "letting go".  I don't think a believer can make a decision to not believe in their deity any more than I could make a decision to believe in one.

I think one can decide to protect a belief.  You can make efforts to safeguard it from difficult questions.

I think the best anyone can do is to try to bring all of your thoughts and ideas into the examination process.  One can choose to do that.

I recall, as I was entering the deconstruction process, deciding that I was going to put all of my beliefs on the table.  I didn't do this lightly.  I FEARED unbelief.

I remember a discussion I had with a believing friend after I left the faith.  He was frustrated with my lack of belief in his god and seemed to take it as a personal insult.  In a moment of frustration, he declared, "Well, at LEAST I BELIEVE in something!"  He was protecting his belief by defining the state of belief itself as a virtue.

But holding to an idea isn't a virtue.  And it is problematic when we give ideas a permanent place in our identity.