A Little Off Topic

While this isn't directly connected to our class, I feel that this is a good forum to get some opinions.

I have recently come up against a lot of resistance from another teacher on the way that I am running my classroom.  I said at the end of last year that I was done giving quizzes.  It was too much hassle for me, too much hassle for the students, took away valuable class time, and really didn't do much.  If students passed or if students brutally failed, we would continue on.  Too much curriculum and too little time to go back and, by the end of the term, I had to have covered the exact same amount of material as the other Freshmen Biology teachers.

Personally, I hate quizzes.  I hated taking them when I was in school, I hated giving them as a teacher, I hated grading them, and I hated the fact that they fed so heavily into a student's grade.  I decided that this year was going to be project based.  At the end of each subunit we would complete a new project with a new product that students needed to create.  It would focus on strengthening their writing and the only tests they would take would be the mandatory end of term common assessments.  Aside from this, I wanted to introduce more labs.  Biology is, afterall, a lab course.  Were it not for the labs, I would have hated Biology.  Not only that, but as vocational students, they are all about hands on learning.

This was working just fine for me until this other teacher caught wind of the fact that I haven't given a single quiz.  She is very by the books.  Present the information, take notes, do some worksheets, take a quiz, pass the MCAS.  I explained what I am doing and also pointed out that (in my second year of teaching) my midterm scores were comparable to hers and better than some of the other teachers.

Since then it has been a constant push to do quizzes.  I borrowed a system of TurningPoint clickers and found that the students LOVE them and it allows me to see what each individual student knows, but even that isn't enough.  "They should be writing... They need to take the MCAS in June".  I believe that I have them writing enough and that, maybe, the real issue is that if my way of doing things works better, everyone else might have to follow.

I will provide some examples of the projects that I have had students do.  Some need a little refinement before next year, but overall I have been thrilled with what I have been getting from them.

Towards the beginning of the year, after learning about enzymes, I assigned students this Enzyme Invention Project where they had to invent and market their own enzymes with the option of making a pamphlet, an infomercial, or a small poster.  The results were awesome and students REALLY understood enzymes afterwards.

Later, while learning about bacteria, students paired up and collected bacteria samples from two different locations in the school.  They then grew it, tested it to determine whether it was disease causing and then wrote a Letter to the Principal.  While students were initially doubtful of her involvement she came by once the letters had all been revised and graded and talked with students about their ideas and what the school would do to follow through.  Personally, this was my favorite project of the year.  It was writing with a purpose and some students really loved this.

Most recently, students conducted a lab in which they tested cellular transport in eggs.  They then had to give an Egg Lab Presentation in front of the class after having prepared their scripts.  This was a little rough, but in the end students "shelled out" some great projects.  Everyone was able to explain just what they believe had happened in their labs.

Overall, I have been thrilled with the writing that they have been doing, but I guess only time will tell if their success on common assessments as well as on my projects will translate into MCAS success.  Quick formative assessments with MCAS questions have, overall, been very good.

To conclude this very long blog entry, what do you guys think?  I know that a lot of you aren't in classrooms yourselves, but how do you feel about the quiz vs project debate?

What Does it Mean to Really Care?

I found the article on caring to be really interesting.  There were a lot of parallels that I saw with the school that I work at, as well as with the students that I work with.

One of the things that jumped out at me was in one of the discussions where Reina, one of the students being interviewed said " 'Cause if it ain't clean then I throw stuff around.  But if it is then I won't".  This actually made me laugh out loud.  This is something that I have run into a lot.  If one class leaves a mess, the other classes think that it's alright to do the same.  It is one of those vicious cycles.  The same, according to Reina, goes for the school as a whole.  If it's already a mess, why bother trying to keep it clean?  While the girls tie cleanliness to "Whitness", I don't think that that is necessarily the case.  Believe me, I know some messy white people!  It is more an attitude of "Why should I bother putting in the effort if no one else is.  I can get away with it."

Another comment that struck me, for a different reason, was where Ms. Evans explains that "I think that they need to realize that this child could be your child.  You have to treat that child as if they have your last name.  And what does that call for?  Patience, tolerance."  Many teachers at my school assume that these kids are bad.  Their home lives may not be great, their parents probably don't care, and they need to be sent out every chance they get.  I myself have been guilty of depleting my patience with a certain student and snapping.  It's one of the most difficult things sometimes NOT to snap at a particularly challenging student.  That being said, I completely agree with Ms Evans.  I think that not only is it important to have as much patience and tolerance as you can, but also not to pull a Mr Rosenfield and run your classroom like an army general.  That is also an easy role to fall into, especially in particularly challenging classes, where positive behavior is rare.

Finally, I think the main takeaway of the article was in the last section.  In my personal opinion, the most important part of teaching is not "getting through the curriculum", it is "listen[ing] to stories, of all sorts, in order to enrich [your] own reality".  That entire section really hits the nail on the head.  Whenever I get a chance I sit down with my students and chat.  I ask them about where they came from, I ask them about their weekends, I ask them about their vacations, what they had for breakfast, whatever!  I think that it makes a huge difference.  Caring is not telling your students "I want you to pass the MCAS and get a good grade in this class" caring is listening to what they have to say and acknowledging that it has merit, even if it is something that seems trivial.  Everyone wants to feel important and wants to feel like what they are saying matters.  To me, we have the ability to do that everyday.  This past Thursday students had 3 minutes to complain.  We didn't get a snow day and everyone was upset.  I sat there quietly while the classes shouted their complaints about the snow day, and homework from English class, and whatever else.  It doesn't have to be big.  You don't have to be Dr. Phil.  You just need to listen and let students know that you are there for them.  As the article said, positive relationships are what learning is built on.  If you aren't interested in what students have to say, why should they be interested in what you have to say?