When We Assume Sameness

We look the same, well kind of, my husband and I.  Both caucasian, both tall, early to mid-thirties, quick to smile and seemingly always taking care of a child.  Our values are pretty much the same, our hopes and dreams.  We aspire to be the best parents we can be.  We aspire to be secure, in love, and involved adults.  We dream much the same.  And yet, even with all of our similarities, we are quite different.  We come from different cultures and backgrounds that permeate every decision we make.  Yet, to an untrained eye one would never assume that I hail from a country other than the USA.  To an untrained eye I look as American as apple pie.

But those differences linger and they erupt from time to time.  Our norms are slightly different, our expectations widely so at times.  The way we treat friends, what we consider the norms of social behavior are different.  Small tiffs can erupt based on this, moments where we do not see eye to eye and have a hard time doing so because our background dictates a different world view.  The expectations we have for our children and their behavior vary, much of it based on what is deemed appropriate and respectful in our differing nations.  And yet we look the same so you would never know but those differences linger just below the surface, ready to show themselves whenever a situation arises.

How often do we do that to students who look like us?  We assume they must have been raised in a society and culture much like our own and thus set our expectations accordingly.  We speak so much about recognizing students from other cultures and embracing them and our differences but often only apply it to those that look markedly different than us.  If a child speaks another language, well then we expect differences in norms and behaviors   But when a white kid, blonde, blue eyed like myself doesn't act like a "typical" white, blonde blue-eyed kid, then we get confused.  We might have to do a little digging to find out that  child is not from the same background as ours.  And then we realize, oh, they are different, not quite what I had expected.

And as for me?  I get assumed American all the time and yet Denmark raises its children markedly different than the typical American ways.  The differences are subtle, but they are there, and they explain many parts of my personality.  So perhaps our assumptions of likeness need to just stop.  Yes, it is nice to assume that w all come from the same background, but we don't.  Perhaps when we embrace children from other cultures we need to move past the skin color and language they speak and truly see the whole gamut of differences we may have.  I know my life would be slightly easier if we did.

What the #Nerdybookclub Taught Me About Reading

I have always been slightly nerdy, ask my oldest friends and they will tell you stories of eye rolls whenever I discussed the latest sci fi flick I couldn't wait to see.  Or get me started on a favorite author and watch.  I haven't ever been a geek, I would have to be really good at math for that, but a nerd, that I could embrace.  My adulthood didn't change my nerdy ways but only sophisticated them.  I could now pass ubernerdy things of as cool and stand behind them tall.  And when being a nerd became kind of cool, I was so nerdy, that even my husband still laughed a little bit at me when i got too out there.

So when I fell into the Nerdy Book Club I knew I was at home.  All of these book lovers in one group, oh and the hashtag and the chats; I was home.  And yet even I could not have realized how much the Nerdy Book Club would change me and the way I teach.

So The Nerdy Book Club taught me that

• It is okay to get really, really excited about a book and want to give it to everyone I meet.  I am thinking of you "The One and Only Ivan."

• It is ok to want to talk books with friends, even if those friends are 20 years younger than you.

• It is ok to bring in my books to school and perhaps sneak a chapter or two during recess.

• It is ok to weed out my library and finally get rid of the books that no one has touched, no one will touch, and to give them to others who might.

• It is ok to not do book talks.

• It is ok to not do whole group books unless it is so deep and so rich that the whole class will actually stay engaged.

• It is ok to tweet out pictures of new books you have received because you are so gosh darn excited about reading them.

• It is ok to tweet authors and hope they will respond to you.

• It is ok to have your class tweet authors and hope even harder that they will respond to them.

• It is ok to have a pile of books beside your bed that never quite seems to diminish and yet entices you to sit down and read every time you pass by it.

• It is ok to change from a clothes shopaholic to a bookaholic as long as you don't go broke.

• It is ok to watch your home library start to bleed into your classroom library because some of your kids are ready for a bigger challenge.

• It is ok to do book challenges as long as they do not suck.

• It is ok to not love a book and tell students that.

• It is ok to make book trailers rather than book projects.

• It is ok to think books, breathe books, talk books even if no one is listening or cares.

• It is ok to have the reading taste of a 5th grade boy.

• It is ok to think that reading and loving books is the most important thing we can ever model for our students and our own children.

Thank you Nerdy Book Club

Related articles

• This Is Why We Hate Reading (pernilleripp.com)
• Having A Classroom Library is Not Enough (pernilleripp.com)
• Book Suggestions 2013 (globalreadaloud.com)
• A Friend from Out Of A Book (kidblog.org)

Not All Students Care About Their Test Results So Do We Make Them?

image from icanread

As the testing machine continues to churn in our public schools we seem to have forgotten that not all students actually care to do well on them.  Not all students do their best.  Not all students try their hardest.  Yet we operate under the assumption that of course they must care whatever the test result will be because it has an impact on their life, right?

Coming from a 5th grade grade perspective this is a reoccurring theme in class.  Some students want to do well because they want to please me, some students want to do well because they like taking tests, and some students, well, they just don't really care.  And I don't want to get them to care.  I tried, once, by having them know their previous time for taking the test and encouraged them to slow down and really think about it, take their time and be meticulous.  What happened?  Most of them were so riddled with anxiety since I had ow placed so much importance on the test that they did worse than if I had kept my mouth shut.  Lesson learned.

Yet, those same test scores will in the future be part of my educator effectiveness score thanks to our governor   Those tests that most of my students whiz through not because they are mastering them but because they don't really give a hoot, will directly determine whether I have a job or not.  And yes, the computer tries to slow them down and even gives me an error rate which no one then cares about because they are only looking at the final score.  So I face a dilemma; do I try to make them care or do I close my eyes and wish for the best?  We joke around about sabotaging the first test of the year so that students automatically will show growth  and yet, I could never do that to my students.  What kind of lunacy would I be feeding into then?  I would be placing importance on an arbitrary test that I don't find important at all.

Standardized test operate under this false assumption that all students will try their best thus leading to an accurate view of their knowledge level, thus leading to how effective I have been as a teacher and how smart they are as students.  How anyone can follow that logic and agree astounds me.  It fails to take into consideration motivation, outside factors, and general attitude in classroom, and yet, all the "experts" say that it is fair.  Fair to whom? The people who wrote the test and sold them?  The kids who have to pretend to care what a computer tells them they can or cannot do?  Fair to a teacher who works their tail off to make school engaging and relevant, everything the tests are not? I don't know.  But something is rotten in the testing machine.

Related articles

• Is It the Standards Fault that They Worry Me? (coopcatalyst.wordpress.com)
• Let's Celebrate Those Kids (pernilleripp.com)
• Where Did the Year Go? It Is Not Too Late to Make Changes (pernilleripp.com)

My Blog Goes to Facebook

I am still not sure where I am headed with this, but I am trying it anyway.  I felt that this blog, "Blogging Through the Fourth Dimension" needed another dimension, one in which people can interact more and express their opinions. I also wanted a place to showcase some of the incredible stuff I see and read on a day-to-day basis, somewhere to collect my thoughts other than Twitter with its fast pace.

So I have a Facebook page now for the blog, nothing too fancy, nothing too much, just a simple page where I hope others will share their thoughts on the thoughts I share.  Where I hope others will post things that make them think.  Join me there for another dimension than just this one.

Join this blog on Facebook. 

Just Practice It Again and Again and Again

"You’re going to practice it again and again and again and again. . . so there’s a chance you can finally do that level of work.”

Words taken directly from the video "From the Page to the Classroom: Implementing the Common Core State Standards - English Language Arts and Literacy" Words that chill me to my bones.  If you ever want a child to tune out of their education, you ask them to practice the same skill again and again in the same way.  Not reading a lot, but reading one book over and over until it is mastered.  Doing the same math problem over and over.  We know that it is not just repetition that fosters understanding, but relevance, interest, and engagement as well.  Students stay engaged when they are faced with problems that they can successfully master or can access different ways of getting through them.  Students become successful when their curiosity is piqued.  How does repetition of the same thing pique anyone's curiosity?

I was awful at math in gymnasium, and yet I had chosen it as my line of study.  I asked my teacher for help again and again, and over and over she showed me the same way to do the same problem, failing to understand that us being stuck in this track of help led us nowhere.  I needed a new approach, someone else to explain it to me and so do our students; if a book is not helping them, then we must search for something else.  If the approach that I take to explain something is not helpful then another way must be found.  

Now I now some people will say that repetition is how we learn anything, and yes, thoughtful repetition does help us learn.  Repetition in the type of problem we encounter, but not the actual problem itself.  So forcing a child to read the same text whether it is accesible to them or not hoping that they will catch up to their peers is ludicrous to begin with and then having them re-read it over and over in the hopes that it will all of a sudden click, well that is just insanity.

So when we now all rush to implement the common core, will we be the ones telling our students to just do it again and again and again?  Or will we be the ones that find a way to work with the standards, ensuring that our students' curiosity for learning is protected?  And has anyone stopped to ask the students how they want to learn?  Or do their opinions not matter?

Related articles

• Where Did the Year Go? It Is Not Too Late to Make Changes (pernilleripp.com)
• This Is Why We Hate Reading (pernilleripp.com)

Where Did the Year Go? It Is Not Too Late to Make Changes

Today we go on spring break and as I keep telling my new teacher colleague, after spring break the yesar seems to speed up and disappear before our eyes.  All of a sudden even the most experienced teacher starts to feel like they are not doing enough, have not gotten where they though they would, and we intensify our desire to teach more, do more, push more.  Yet, the last few months of the year is not the time to get stuck in routines or expectations, for me it has always been the time to really explore, push my students, and create.

So it is not too late to

• Start blogging with your students.  Even 3 months of blogging is an incredible experience.  This year with my maternity leave we didn't start until mid-November and yet my students have taken our blogging to a new level amassing more than 1,600 comments.  Look at my friend Rob Hunt's class, they just started a few weeks ago and are already master bloggers.  If you need help on why and how please see this page.  
• Get a class Twitter account.  I admit it, I was a skeptic   Even though I love Twitter, I didn't see much point in my students as a class being on there as well.  Perhaps it just seemed like too much.  On a whim, I went against my own senses and did create them one @MrsRippsClass and it has been amazing to see what they have used it for.  They have tweeted authors  and received replies (!!!), They have asked for book recommendations, recommended great videos, and shared their live learning   I am already excited about what else we can think to use Twitter for.
• Do something hands-on.  I know we tend to pull the reins tighter as students get more squirrly but I have found that if I give them even more autonomy  choice, and freedom in our classroom they live up to the challenge.  Now is the time to really push them.
• Put it all together.  I really start to focus more on themes in our learning and bridging it all during these last few months.  One example is their dream city project currently happening; a fantastic exploration of scale, area, and models combining math, art, and science.  The best part?  The students don't even know how much work their brains are doing.
• Give them authentic responsibility.  We love doing Mystery Skypes and have become pretty good at them, yet sometimes they just fall apart on us.  The students have taken on the roles as discussion facilitators and teachers and have changed our process quite a bit.  They are living up to the responsibility I am offering up to them and see the results directly in their work.  I step out of the picture.
• Start planning for Innovation Day.  My students know this won't happen until May but their wheels are already turning.  They cannot wait to do this day of intense student-driven passion-led exploration day and I cannot wait to see what they will come up.
• Incorporate Genius Hour.  20% Projects, Genius Hour, Hour of Power, whatever you choose to call it but look for opportunities within your curriculum to have students self-explore topics.  The concept is simple; research, create, and deliver all within an hour of the week.  We will be doing this in social studies after break.
• Get involved globally.  Whether through quad blogging, signing up for the Global Read Aloud (which won't actually happen until October), or doing Projects by Jen; do something global.  My students are currently working on a video introduction of our classroom for a 12th grade in Singapore, contact facilitated through Twitter.  They love figuring out how to showcase our room in a positive manner and it is all student-led.

Now is the time to push your students, have a ton of fun, and let them be independent learners.  Trust me you will not regret it.

Let's Celebrate Those Kids

Ask my husband and he will tell you, I seem to have been in a funk lately.  Nothing serious but just the feeling of a cloud hanging over my head.  Today, during our staff meeting, as we discussed gains in test scores, I couldn't help but feel a little more down.  Yes, gains in test scores are something to acknowledge but there are so many other things I would rather celebrate.

How about we celebrate the kid who 2 months ago couldn't go a day without telling me how much he hated writing, who today told me his story was done but that perhaps he needed more details.

How about we celebrate the kid who asked if they could blog just one more time because they really had something they needed to say to the world.

Let's celebrate the kid who told me they couldn't wait for Wednesday where they would get to build their model in science.

Or the groups of kids who told me not to worry about a sub tomorrow because they know exactly what to do and could probably run the day without the teacher.  We promise we will make you proud, Mrs. Ripp.

Let's celebrate the kid who volunteers, even for the boring stuff, just because they want to help.

Or the kid who always has a compliment to whomever seems to need it the most.

Let's celebrate the child that remembered the formula for a triangle and then was able to teach the rest of the class.

Let's celebrate the kids that know they are onto something but just not quite sure how to get there.

Let's celebrate the kid who told me they were starting over because this was no good and they knew it and there had to be a better way.

Let's celebrate the kids who try, try, try and then tell others about how they are trying.

The kids who aren't afraid to put their faith in me every day hoping that the adventure we are about to go on is something worth there time.

Let's celebrate those kids and their accomplishments.

Not always their test scores.

Not always their data.

But them, those kids.  Let's celebrate them.

Related articles

• This Is Why We Hate Reading (pernilleripp.com)
• I Make Them Blog But Do They Want To? (pernilleripp.com)
• In Which I Get Schooled By A Kid (pernilleripp.com)

School Should Not Be About the Report Card so Why Do We Let it Be?

I feel like a fraud.  All week I have been discussing grades with my students as we prepare to release the second trimester report card.  All weeks I have been telling them they are "3's" or "4's" and why they are these arbitrary numbers.  I have wished for ownership of their learning.  I have wished for them to understand what that number means and how it looks in their work.  I have wished for them to see that everything they are working towards cannot just be distilled into a number and yet we are going to try.  I have had so many reflective periods in class that I am not sure they even know what they need to reflect on anymore in the hopes that they will buck the numbers.  And yet, when I sat them down, one-by-one, to ask them what their goals were for the final trimester, most answered, "To get more 4's."

Argh.

Yet, I know the fault is my own.  I have tried to humanize a report card   To make it mean something to the kids.  I have tried to elevate it to something of importance rather than just add it as another part of their journey.  I have let it take center stage rather than just pointing it out as one more representation of their learning and then moving on.

This is not what school is about.  This is not what school should be about.  I have tried all year to have my students own their learning and own their journey and yet, this week, I set them back so far.  I forgot how much I hate grades.  I forgot how much I do not want to talk about them.  I forgot about how little they truly mean in education.

Related articles

• Another Failed Report Card (pernilleripp.com)

This Is Why We Hate Reading

"...Mommy, just one more book...' Thea is yelling me from her bedroom after I have tucked her in, read her a book and handed her 3 more to "read."  The book lover in me shrugs ..."Just one, then sleep."  I smile, we are a house of readers.

"...Mrs.Ripp, just 5 more minutes?"  My students are giving me pleading eyes, they want 5 more minutes to read their books even though they know it is the end of the day and really we should be packing up.  We are a class of readers,

And yet, the thought keeps nagging me.  Why do kids start to hate reading?  What will happen to Thea when she enters school, will she want just one more book, 5 more minutes?  Or will she become like many students; reluctant to read, hesitant to dream about more books?  Will my students lose their love when they go to middle school?

So I ask my students; what makes kids hate reading?  Their first response fills my heart, "But we don't hate reading, Mrs. Ripp, not this year."  So I prod and ask them why not?  What do you think I could do to make you hate reading?  What do you think happens in middle school where we seem to lose kids as readers.  They journal about it and then ask to go back to their books.

Reading their responses, I am not surprised   Kids do not want to be told what to read.  They do not want books assigned.  They do not want to sit in small groups and discuss a shared book. They want choice.  They want freedom.  But they also want a little bit of guidance.  Many of my students write how it is important for teachers to read and know which books to recommend.  Many of my kids realize that sometimes they will have to read things they do not want to but wonder whether it can be a short text rather than a guided book group..

One child journals about how teachers should always read the books first and then try to think how it will feel for a student to read it; to experience it the way they do.  Then they bring up the time factor; give us time to read.  We do sports, we want to spend time with our family and sometimes we are reading another book outside of school.  Reduce our homework so that we can read.  If you really believe in reading; invest in it as a class.

One student makes me smile with their answer; "Many teachers say they love reading but then their face is all gloomy when they teach it."  Yes, perhaps we as teachers love to read but forget to bring in that infectiousness to our classrooms.  Bring in the passion, it's contagious.

In the end, I was not surprised  not too much anyway.  We know how to make kids hate reading because it is the same things that make us hate reading as adults.

So take my students' advice
Love reading yourself
Give them time to read
Know your books
Share your passion
and give them choice

Then see what happens.

Update; My students heard I had blogged about their responses and they wanted to add these two thoughts:

• Don't do reading logs.  Ever.  Trust them instead to read.  The logs get falsified anyway and end up being homework for parents.
• Reconsider the classics.  we may have thought we know all the classics and that students should read them and yes, I have a love of classics as well, but add new ones to that list.  The One and Only Ivan will be a classic one day just like Charlotte's Web so why not include that one?

Another Failed Report Card

I thought I had dealt with it right; have students grade themselves for the trimester since I have to post grades then.  At least they would be coming from the students rather than just me.  Since we have switched to standards based report cards, I projected and explained what each category meant on this new report card.  Then we discussed what a "3" meant vs a "4" and off they went.  They handed them in, I looked them over and highlighted anything I wanted to discuss.

At conferences I pulled them out and asked the students about the highlighted areas.  Blank stares.  I then prodded a little bit more, why would you give yourself this grade, what was your thought process?  Blank stare, then cleared throats,...."I'm actually not sure what that means so I just put a number there..."

Exactly.

These kids, even after I explain what the things are I am grading them on, they have no clue what it really is.  Perhaps it is due to poorly written report card language, perhaps it is due to not speaking educationalese, perhaps it is due to that what we grade them on most of the time seems to bear little resemblance to what we do in our classrooms, the discussions we have.  Sure, we discuss and use the term comprehension strategies but if they are all lumped together in one box, then how will a child know if they use all of them well or just some of them.  How will they know what that even means, to use them?  And does it really matter?  Parents don't know what they mean either and they come armed with years of schooling and college degrees.  So we think of attaching explanation sheets to the report cards just so they can have some sort of a clue as to the terms we so flippantly throw around.  Now do you get it, it seems to scream.

We move toward better report cards so that we hope to better tell parents what their child has mastered or not, but in the end, when we create report cards that bear little resemblance to the conversation that happens within the classroom, what does it really matter?  Should I once again change the way I teach to make sure I use terms that will appear on a reportcard, even though those terms do not always fit what we are teaching or even within the understanding of my students?  Should I barge on, use the terms, just so students may know what they mean when they get their grades?  Or should we ask the students what the report card should look like so that they could take ownership of their learning journey?

I dont have the answers, do you?

In Which I Get Schooled By A Kid

This post is not to garner pity, or poor you kind of comments.  It is not to embarrass or to make myself look terrible.  It is to speak the truth of how teachers are merely humans and although we would like to be infallible, we are far from it.  Although we would like to think we always know best, we don't.

Chalk it up to sleep deprivation going on for about 10 days.  That's what happens when everyone in your household has the flu and you are the only one healthy enough to be caretaker.  Chalk it up to being distracted; too many things going on, both in school, and outside.  Chalk it up to forgetting who I am, if even for a minute, and going back to those old ways.  Chalk it up to whatever you want but today I got schooled by a kid, and I deserved every bit of it.  I called this kid out infront of the class and made him so angry.  Instead of backing off and thinking about it, I kept at it, letting him get more angry, until a break was needed.  I wanted to be right so bad, that I forgot for a moment that this was a kid in front of me.  Perhaps I was a little bit right, but nowhere near the amount needed for that type of  confrontation.

I went home, reflected, admitted to myself that that was poorly handled and that I had to reach out tomorrow.  Once again, this kid beat me to it.  This kid, this so angry kid, sent me the most eloquent email telling me exactly what was going on.  Telling me exactly why he got so very angry and exactly what I did to push him there.  He wrote to apologize but also wanted to make sure I heard his side, and hear it I did.  Not like I had heard it today in the classroom, but really hear it, no filter, no holding back.

Instead of getting angry, I saw what this email really was; a way in, a gift really, a way to repair a relationship that otherwise may have been fractured for the rest of the year.  This kid gave me a chance again.  This kid gave me a chance to redeem myself, to become a better teacher, to remember that I teach someone's child.  Thank you.  I am sorry.

My Students Are Not Digital Natives

My students are not digital natives.  There I said it.  They are digital consumers, much like the rest of us, but natives, not so much.  I used to believe in the whole digital native myth and that if I just gave them a device they would be able to make it work and adapt it to their needs.  Make it work; sure, adapt it; not really.  Push themselves beyond their comfort level; very rarely unless they have an interest in all things technology.  Yes, most of them are afraid of technology just like many adults.   Most of them don't want to just figure things out even when I encourage them to, they would rather just be told how to use it and then use it for that specific purpose only.  So even though I tell them to just figure it out, my 5th graders would laugh if anyone called them digital natives, and then they would ask what that term even meant.  So why do we persist with the pushing of the digital native persona?

Tonight I asked that question on Twitter, or rather I made a statement:

As always Twitter did not disappoint...

 

 

So what are our students?  Do we really need to label them?  I like to think of my students as kids who like technology a lot, but I have never called them that.  Should I?  Should anyone?