All I really have to say right now is...

...being a teacher is really, really hard sometimes.


(edit @ 4:10 PM) and I'm also going to hopefully make a massive post sometime this week.

I swear I have a giant update that chronicles my first two weeks at Thurgood Marshall coming soon. It has been an interesting time so far, but the work is really starting to pile on as I handle more and more in the classroom. Things are picking up with APO too, as we have our new spring pledge class and all the extra (but exciting) things that come with that. One thing that doesn't come with these extra commitments is extra sleep, and I'm eagerly looking forward to spending lots of time in my bed this weekend.

The past few days were a test. The DC History classes are going well, mostly because I'm only teaching the first 30 minutes of those right now and Kathryn handles the rest, or at least she is the one in the drivers seat for the rest of those periods. I open each of those classes with an article from the Washington Post Metro section, accompanied by four or five questions I've written for the class to answer and discuss. We use the questions to scaffold into a short, opinion-driven discussion on the subject matter of the article. Unfortunately, the local section of the Post has been pretty dray as of late. Most of the stories have been about DC's failing schools, neighborhood crime, or District politics. I've had to use the latter for most of the articles (because crime and failing schools are a day-to-day affair for these kids), but that is frustrating because many of the students couldn't even explain a two-party system. I do a lot of explaining, but we've been getting the work done.

The three US history classes are an entirely different story. One of the US classes is just so far ahead of the other two in ability and this really impacts the way we do things. We've had the opportunity to do some awesome group activities in this class that have genuinely contributed to the students' understanding of the content. The other two classes...we get by.

The past several classes for US history focused on the end of World War II and the Holocaust. The Holocaust basically needs to be taught in 90 minutes, as did the end of the war in Europe. In my high school, periods were 41 minutes, and I don't remember how many we spent on the Holocaust, but after four years of college history , I feel as if it is an injustice to discuss anything in under 90 minutes (though I realize this is my flaw/problem, not that of the curriculum).

Last week, we watched "the beach" scene of Saving Private Ryan with the US classes. I saw it a total of 3 times in 24 hours, so I felt awesome about life. First period took it well, remained composed during the showing, and had insightful questions after we watched. We had the opportunity to discuss the logistics of the Normandy landings, their impact on the course of the war, and the actual hardships faced by these soldiers/how terribly accurate the film actually is in this scene. On top of that, at my direction, we talked a little bit about how prisoners of war are to be treated under the Geneva convention and that it is a war crime to kill prisoners or surrendering enemy soldiers; something that Saving Private Ryan was one of the first movies to show American soldiers doing. Touching on this helped the class understand a bit more about how terrible war is and that war crimes are something that will inevitably happen on both sides. I wish we could have had the time to pick the movie apart more (especially some of the other parts that seem to fly under the radar for most people, i.e. gratuitous shooting of dead German soldiers) but this is an 11th grade US history class, not Cinema 101.

Periods three and five were different. I think the intense amount of violence made them uncomfortable, which led to lots of laughing during the scene, but I do know some of them were genuinely entertained. When we tried to discuss the killing of surrendered troops, the Geneva Convention, and the other battlefield conditions at Normandy, they were generally unresponsive or displayed enthusiasm and support when it came to killing the "bad guys," regardless of ethics. I'm probably letting this frustrate me more than it should.

Today we watched a moving documentary on the Holocaust from 1995. It was excellent. Period one agreed and we had a productive discussion around it, but period three had a few students fall asleep. They just weren't connecting to the material, at all. When we moved into the discussion, one student (who is quite bright but holds some radical viewpoints about race relations) asked how many people were killed in the Holocaust. I told him it was six million Jews and about six million other people considered to be sub-human by the Nazis in the course of about five years. His response was, "That's all?"

"That's All?" He proceeded to try to defend this question by comparing it to the "African Holocaust" which he said he saw a movie on and had a book in his backpack about. Kathryn and I asked him to explain this. He couldn't, but continued to defend himself. I told him if he loaned me the book, I would read it before his next class on Wednesday, because I was genuinely interested in whatever he was talking about, but skeptical of whatever numbers might be involved in this. I assume he was referring to the hundreds of years of slavery endured by Africans, but that doesn't excuse "That's All?" By this point in his argument with us, the rest of the class become critical of him and realized he had nothing to back himself up with (and take note that Thurgood Marshall is 100% African-American). Later in the period, when Kathryn and I were explaining to the class that they needed to actually DO SOMETHING on their research paper assignment (which is going HORRIBLY for periods 3 and 5) to get results, he got argumentative again and tried to use his socioeconomic status as an excuse for failing the class.

I'm at Eboard right now, and I actually need to get back to paying attention. My bad. Wednesday I'm giving a presentation on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which I have yet to finish. Friday and most of next week, I'll be teaching to my own lesson plans. Woooo!

Also, I promise that my actual update about my first two weeks (pictures and all) will come soon.

Starting Student Teaching: Part I

Last night we got a few inches of snow and DCPS was on a two hour delay today. Thurgood Marshall was supposed to have a half day, so in the event of a 2 hour delay, we would close completely. This is what happened. I'm still in my pajamas and I haven't done much today, so I'll finally write this blog post I have wanted to churn out. Excuse my writing; it will not be very good. I will also omit as many names as possible for privacy reasons, so it could get confusing.

First, we need to rewind a bit, but I am just not sure to where. I guess to simplify things; we'll go to October 20, 2010. This is the day I handed in all of my paperwork for my spring 2011 Student Teaching Placement through American University. The forms were due sometime in the last week of October or maybe even November 1st, so I wasn't rushing them in at the last minute. January 10, 2011 would be my first day of student teaching. I picked 3 schools as top preferences for my placement, but I ultimately had little control over the outcome. I knew I wanted to teach in a DC school (as tempting as requesting a placement in Montgomery County was, it ran the risk of being #1 too far away and #2 too easy, if that makes sense). I chose Bell Multicultural, Banneker Academic, and Wilson High School as my top three choices. These are all high schools, but the first two are charter schools. I picked them based on their quality and proximity to my apartment; I didn't want to make a huge public transportation commute every day to my school.

With my applications done, I awaited my placement. Meanwhile, I was in the middle of my practicum placement at Hardy Middle School at the top of Georgetown. Hardy is a public middle school in the affluent Ward 2, but most of the students are coming from the other side of 16th Street NW, many even from Wards 7 and 8. My cooperating teacher there was well liked and had been in the school for 7 or 8 years teaching 7th grade world history. He coached football and basketball and seemed to have a good relationship with most of the students, especially the 7th and 8th grade boys he coached. The school itself was a different story. Patrick Pope, a wildly popular principal, had been re-assigned to work in the DCPS offices by Michelle Rhee at the end of the prior school year. A new principal, Dana Nuremberg, was his replacement. She had come from an elementary school in DCPS...which she was still also the principal of. Dana would split her time between a middle school and elementary school.

Apparently, it was only parents and students, not administrators, which realized this was one of the worst ideas anyone in public schools has had. With a new principal came other, ill-thought-out changes, like shifting from a block schedule to 43/46 minute periods and giving the faculty limited professional development on the shift. On top of that, school parents were angry at Rhee about the changes and also some comments she allegedly made about intention to "turn" the school, meaning she wanted to make it appeal to the affluent white residents of Wards 1 and 2 (Hardy's student body is mostly black, but does have many white, Latino, and Asian students).

It was also around mid-October that my cooperating teacher was reviewed by his "Master Educator," an individual picked by DCPS to critique teachers and evaluate their performances (so the district administration can decide who to fire). The Master Educator, or ME, observed 30 minutes of instruction by my cooperating teacher (30 minutes of a 46 minute lesson) and evaluated him based on only what he saw then. My CT scored very low. In past years, he scored much higher, but the assessment standards changed this year. After this meeting and getting a low score, my CT was distraught and was starting to "check out." Over my next few visits at Hardy, he proceeded to 1) forget to tell me about a field trip the school was going on until the last minute, and 2) call in sick twice only to notify the school at the last minute. This brings me to the next episode of this experience.

Twice in three weeks my CT called in sick. Both times, Hardy administration did NOT get me a student teacher (it is my understanding that this is illegal, but we'll ignore that for now). Both of these times, I was alone in the classroom all day, teaching 5 periods of 150 7th graders. The administration was well aware that I was alone in the classroom and was not yet a certified teacher; one of the days I even had to get the keys to the classroom directly from the principal. These two days on my own were constructive learning experiences that I gained a lot from. They were also slightly traumatic. 12 and 13 year old students, especially the girls, can really make things hard for a teacher.

I made it through those days. I was surprised at how well I was able to handle a classroom on my own, and everything went pretty well except for the 8th period class. My professors and advisers at AU were shocked when I told them about what happened.

This is all in the past now. Fast forward: as of yesterday (January 26, 2011) Dana Nuremberg has been re-assigned. She will again be just the principal at the elementary school. The Washington Post article I read this in said she was reassigned because two principal positions were too much for one person, no matter how competent and capable (and Dana is both of these things) they are. No shit.

This brings us to the stuff that has happened so far this semester. I mentioned in the start of this post that I had handed in all the forms I needed for student teaching in October and my placement was to begin January 10. All throughout winter break, I waited to hear where I my placement was going to be. At one point, the AU coordinator who is in charge of obtaining placements for the students sent out an email to everyone asking us NOT to contact her about the status of our placements. When January 10th came, I didn't have a placement. I did get an email from the coordinator updating me and telling me that my top choices were still up in the air, but there was another placement available immediately at Roosevelt High School. Roosevelt is a tough school. I didn't really want a placement there, but I said I would be open to it if my top choices didn't work. Then I got really sick for a few days and didn't think about much.

When I was feeling better, I began emailing again asking the status of my placement. These really didn't get me anywhere. I met last Wednesday with the director of the teacher education program. I told her I was anxious and frustrated that I didn't have a placement and it was already the second week of the semester and I wanted to start as soon as possible. She promised me I would start on Monday. That Thursday I don't hear anything, and on Friday night (after I get home from work) I got an email from coordinator saying that 1) the previously confirmed placement at Roosevelt wasn't available anymore (and actually never was) 2) there might be a placement available at Thurgood Marshall Academy and 3) totally neglecting to mention the status of Wilson or the other school. In my response, I basically said I would take the Marshall placement to start something ASAP, even though Marshall is ten miles away and would cost me 35 dollars and 10 hours per week to get there and back. As I was replying to her on a Friday, I didn't hear anything for the rest of the weekend.

When Monday came, I remembered that the director promised me that I would be starting a placement today. I called the program director and the coordinator twice in the morning and left messages for both of them. They work in the same room together; someone had to have been there at 10 AM on a Monday morning. Around 11, I get an email back from the coordinator saying she might be able to place me at Dunbar High School if I am willing to wait (which I am not and I made that clear) and to look at the Marshall website for more information. I called her directly upon getting this email, only to get no answer. I emailed her back and said I didn't care what was going on, I wanted to start at Thurgood Marshall immediately (because my desire to start immediately was something I must have not made clear in my other emails and voicemails) and asked for the contact information for my cooperating teacher.

About an hour later, I just got a forwarded email from the coordinator that she had sent to my cooperating teacher to-be, Kathryn. In the email, the coordinator seemed to poorly answer the questions Kathryn had about the placement, and she also told Kathryn I would start the following Monday. The rest of the forwarded email chain made it clear to me that Kathryn had just as frustrating of a time dealing with the coordinator as I did. So I emailed Kathryn directly and told her about myself and said I wanted to start right away. Before I knew it, we had made plans to start the very next day. Sometimes you can just work wonders if you eliminate the middleman.

I promise the negative parts (which have been most of this post) are over. Tomorrow I will (hopefully) publish the second portion of this post that details all the AWESOME things that have gone on in the two days of my placement, as well as some pictures. I have some extra time in the morning too because the roads are still bad in many places and we are on a two hour delay. Hopefully the buses will run alright and won't break down like my bus did on the way home last night:

Goodnight, Internet.