Ayers Part 2

At Dr. Horwitz’s suggestion, I took an active reading approach while reading the second half of To Teach.  Typically I rely on a highlighter and maybe a few notes in the margin, but this time I armed myself with sticky notes of various sizes and colors (as well as my trusted highlighter) and began reading.  I wasn’t sure what I was going to use the sticky notes for, but I was determined that I would figure it out and throughout my reading, I did.  I color-coded my notes to keep track of “questions I have”, “things I disagree with or don’t seem right”, “ideas I want to try in my classroom”, and “practices I think I’m already good at”.  Here are some of the ideas I discovered while reading…

“Questions I Have/green sticky notes”

At the bottom of pg. 71 I couldn’t help but think of Dr. Bogad’s “igloo” story she shared last year.  She told us of a teacher who used to do an entire unit on igloos – incorporating math, science, social studies, language arts, and many other lessons and activities into her unit.  Now, as Ayers suggest here, students are robbed of that opportunity and only get the “surface knowledge” about a topic.  I know that a big topic in education right now is the shift to the CCSS and I in no way am an expert on it.  I’m wondering if the shift is going to allow the focus to go back more to when ‘igloos’ were allowed?  Will there be any clear change at all?  Will it be up to teachers as individuals?  

“Things I disagree with or don’t seem right/red sticky notes”

Maybe Ayers is just trying to make a point, maybe I’m too cynical, but I struggled with the panels on page 82 where Bill is sitting around waiting for his students to return from standardized testing.  In my experience, if kids are testing, teachers are proctoring.  If for some mysterious reason teachers aren’t proctoring they are grading, observing, on lunch duty, hall duty, standing in line at the copier, attending an IEP meeting, planning… you get the idea.  Just when I was getting frustrated with the fact that he was sitting in a chair he states, “Plus, I’m lonely”, this about put me over the edge.  Maybe I’m cynical, maybe it’s my teaching situation, but I can safely say that I don’t recall having those thoughts as a teacher.  Please disagree with me if I’m wrong – but I was very quick to reach for my red sticky note here!

“Ideas I want to try in my classroom/blue sticky notes”

Alice Jefferson (pg. 46) picks a topic every year that she doesn’t know anything about and does a long-term project surrounding that topic.  I often make excuses that I can’t do small/whole group activities, because my students are all in different grades and they are typically placed in my classroom temporarily.  Therefore, it’s difficult to do projects/activities where we rely on the whole group and take place over a period of time.  A project such as the one that Ms. Jefferson uses would be perfect for my classroom.  Not only would it build on the students’ knowledge of a topic, but it would also build on the feeling of community in my classroom.

“Practices I think I’m already good at/pink sticky notes”

On page 98 and 99 Ayers highlights eight different ideas of how to be a better teacher.  One of the ideas that he focuses on here is, “Linking Consciousness to Conduct.”  This section made me think of Aaron, the student who we read about earlier whose brother was in jail awaiting trial.  Like Aaron, all of our students live in a world outside of our classroom and they all have different experiences, strengths, and struggles that we have to be aware of and sensitive to.  As I shared over both semesters last year, this is something that I really focus on in my classroom and think that it helps to build a sense of community and understanding in my classroom.  Although I think I’m already good at this practice, it’s one that is important to me and that I need to remind myself of on a regular basis.  I think that Ayers did a nice job of referencing this practice here and will remember the “crack in the wall” analogy while working with my students.

These are just a few of my reflections I encountered while reading the second half of this book.  I look forward to reading other blogs and also our class discussion on Wednesday!