Chemistry Test

You can find the information you need to take your test here. You can use your periodic table (or one find elsewhere). You cannot use your lab book, study guide, internet, friends, non-friends, etc. Good luck!

Future of education?

Over the last three years I have witnessed a concerning interest in 'adaptive learning systems'. These systems are computer based programs that provide the exact lesson the student needs in order to gain mastery in a standard. For instance, during a test, a student consistently misses questions about cell parts. At the end of the test the program says "hey, this student needs more work with cell parts. They need to read this section, watch this video, then answer these questions."  The student does this and then takes another test and the program checks for growth. If they do well, the program sends them on to the next standard, if not, they go back to review more material. Eventually, they will progress and everyone can point to the program and say "IT WORKS! Look at that growth, wow! You're a great teacher!"

I have a lot of issues with this, and I fully admit that I am jaded in this area. This goes against every reason why I am in education and the day that someone tells me I will use this is the day I start looking for a school that is not as 'progressive'. First, and most importantly, the majority of my students HATE this style of learning. I don't think this can be glossed over. I want kids excited to come to school. I want them excited about learning. That does not seem to happen doing prescriptive lessons behind a computer. I have never heard a student say they don't need to be in class "because we are just doing a lab" but I have heard you didn't miss much "we just did insert adaptive program name here".

Second, teachers, you are shooting yourself in the foot. Now this is entirely self serving, and someone could read this and say "he's just protecting his job" and they wouldn't be wrong. I love my job, I do want to keep it. But I also want the students to enjoy school. When/If I come to the conclusion that students would rather be behind computers, I will happily move on myself. But my opinion is driven primarily by them, myself a distant second. Why do you need a small class size when they are learning via a computer 50% of the time? Why do you need to get paid for that masters when you just watch students on a computer? Why do you need to be paid for that National Board when anyone can monitor a computer lab. I foresee a shift from teaching to monitoring. I can effectively teach ~20-25 students, I can monitor and assist as needed, 35, 45, maybe 50 students? It is not hard to imagine a computer program that detects you are struggling with balancing equations. It provides a video and extra questions. You still struggle, but specifically you are struggling with counting atoms, so it provides another video and more focused questions. You still struggle, but it is only when there are coefficients in the problem, so it provides another video dialed into that issue. AH -HA the light bulb goes off, you have it! Again, I can admit I am not looking at it completely objectively, but I see it going that way because that's what I do, as as teacher, because I actually teach.

With all that said, I have to acknowledge that it works. I have seen the growth myself. Supposedly, the teacher that has shown the most growth the last 3 years uses one of these programs "almost daily". As an admin, it would be hard to turn it down. If a teacher uses it regularly, you are almost guaranteed results. We are continuing to move towards more and more testing and more and more data, why would I not want that for my school and district? Because it is being done at the expense of exciting students for acquiring knowledge. Because no one in the real world gets paid to learn behind a computer all day. Because the social dynamic is lost between student and teacher that has been at the center of education since the great Greek philosophers.

update 1/28 - Yesterday we got off track and started talking about the school's budget, (I love these students) and they made the comment that we spend too much money on technology, and specifically laptops. I probed further and it turns out they hate the laptops because all they do is use them for taking tests and doing programs. "What's the point of having teachers if someone else is just going to teach us?" -S1.

STEM and underestimating girls

We generally think of boys as needing to be hands on and out of their seat. They are our builders and tinkerers and if teachers would give them the chance to show their intelligence in a different way, then we would see what they are capable of. This year in my classes, it's the girls leading the charge. They regularly beat the boys in almost all categories when we do any design project. Additionally, it was the girls asking why we don't do more of "this stuff", not the boys. It was a group of girls competing at the regional science fair, it was a pair of girls that had the best wind turbine and was ultimately copied by most others, it was an entrepreneurial girl who sold her design plans to all the male dominated groups for a nice price, and it was two girls who split from their group to create a simpler and more efficient turbine than their former male group mates. Finally, they are proud of what they do. They don't fall victim to the ridiculous idea of "I don't want people to know I am smart." Not content with being the unsung heroes, they want to make sure everyone knows just who is leading the pack.

Proudly displayed front and center.

Student (as) Teachers

S1: "If I could teach SS it would be so much better. I can teach better than him."
Me: "Really? It's a little harder than it looks."
S1: "No, I can do it. I can make the class fun. He makes it boring. I can do so much better."

This conversation coupled with this post got the wheels turning on how we could make this work. Two weeks later we turned over our classrooms to the students. Each teacher chose from a number of applicants two students who were interested in teaching that class for the day. "The whole day? Like, every class? All four of them?" was a common string of questions when the idea was proposed. Yep. Every last one of them and all the work associated with it. There were some major positives to come out of it, and a couple of teachers had a big slice of humble pie served up over and over and over....and over. I think all the student teachers learned a little something about themselves ("Next time I have to be way nicer", "I was so exhausted I just went home and slept. That was hard." "I realized you have to give the students what they want. It's not just about MY plan."). And I learned that one of my activities makes me want to rip my eyeballs out, although the students in my group didn't seem nearly as bothered by it as I was.

However, my biggest concern is how students view our classes, and what the potential for those classes could be. I try hard to offer a variety of activities in class, yet only two of the submitted lessons were lab based. The others were book work, lecture, notes, and handouts. There is research that suggests that teachers teach the way they were taught. Through that lens, I can't blame them for the pretty generic lessons. 95% of their schooling has been exactly what they turned into me. But it's not what they want (or is it?) and certainly not what I want to see for an exemplary, once a year lesson.

In the Spirit of the Game

I am not sure how I feel about today's lesson. On one hand students found creative ways to accomplish the task. On the other hand, there was no elegance or artistry to their work. Even now I am surprised with myself at how disappointed I am. The assignment was to create a wind powered vehicle that would move forward. They had limited time and materials and I wanted all students to feel that they could definitely succeed at making it go forward at least a little bit. I thought this would encourage them to take risks and do something creative knowing that if they had an even half way descent design it would be move a little. Instead what I got was the opposite. Very little thought and a "what is the quickest way we can do this to meet the requirements" mentality. I am not sure if it's just the nature of the classes or if the word spread on "the easy way" to do it but by the end of the day all I had were balloons taped to straws with a piece of paper acting as a "wing". It was pathetic from an aesthetic standpoint and severely limited their chance of going the furthest. For me, rarely do I find myself just "doing enough" but really wanting to be first. They were looking for completion, I was looking for excellence. On a positive side, with the exception of 2-3 cases, there was lots of collaboration and discussion going on and everyone enjoyed themselves. Hopefully that will be the take away, but to be honest, I am seriously considering revising my windmill lesson for next week. If I have to create a 1 page list of requirements of do's and don'ts, it is not worth it to me. I need them to want to succeed, but do so with a little creativity.

A little bit of creativity. They ended up redoing the wheels after seeing the cardboard didn't work very well.

Getting ready at the starting line.

*12/10 update. We had our county spontaneous science competition which is more of an engineering competition but whatever, we had fun with it. AND WE ROCKED IT. I couldn't stay to the end but I did get to see the chair competition. They were given a months worth of newspapers, tape, poster paper, string, and a 12x12 carboard "seat". One school decided to stack all their papers together and wrap them in duct tape. Then the next school over came to the same conclusion. Then a third school which had previously been building something like a chair, tore it all down and stacked their paper together with minor modifications to get the height bonus points. I was so proud our team stuck to their plan and actually created something with a bit more creativity and engineering (and a whole lot less material) which ultimately won them the event! 

Classroom supplies

It was like an early Christmas in the room Thursday. By Friday all the book had been checked out and we had started a game of Pandemic with a little bit of free time. Most definitely a huge success so far.

When your students mutiny

Me: "We are going to write a short essay on GMO foods."
S1: "That's boring, I don't want to write about that."
Me: "Well...tough. It's important and we need to cover it."
S1: "Ummm....no. I am going to write about designer babies instead."
S2: "Yeah...that's way better than GMO's. I want to write about that too."

I think I am getting myself into a tight spot here. Are they seriously rejecting what I have planned for the class? Is this a mutiny? Do you not know who I am? I am the Juggernaut! I can insist they write about GMO's as planned, I know they will do a good job with it. They will follow the provided rubric and the students above will most certainly get an A+, but they will not really care about what they are doing. They will learn something because they just naturally soak up everything around them. My essential question of the day will be answered because they will have completed the work leading to that question. Had I been observed, admin would have said I met my learning objective. My standard #whatever would be rocking. But at what cost?

How often do we assign work to our brightest students knowing they will do it because they understand the game of school, but not necessarily because they enjoy doing it? I feel we (myself included) do this group of students a grave injustice. They will go on to college and get jobs and we don't worry about them because "they will make it". Instead we need to focus on those whose future is a little less certain. But I don't really believe that. If your objective is to prepare students for college and/or a job then fine. I don't feel that way. We need to hook and push them all. That student who we knew would go to college does. She goes to Generic University. What if we pushed her more, challenged her, let her control her education and now she is at UNC, Duke, Wake, NCSU? What bar are we setting for them?

Now, I have the opportunity to let them pursue something they are interested in. Tomorrow we can talk about GMO's, I can throw some stuff up on the board and we can have a little discussion and they will know enough to pass the test at the end of the year. But by letting them control the class I know that the work I get will have a little bit of passion in it, it's something that they might remember later on, it might actually change their view of the world...maybe.

Right after this great back and forth they asked to listen to Megan Trainor so we clearly have a long ways to go in terms of changing their views...  I should have been writing my 40+ page paper for grad school tonight but as S1 said "That's boring..." and writing this was way more fulfilling. Now I need to go draw a picture of S1 getting eaten by a monster because that sounds better too.