Month: February 2023

Self-Evaluation

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The Peter Principle (people in an organization tend to rise to the level of their incompetence) always seemed such a harsh concept. No one wants to be told they are incompetent. But, it is reality. The move from sales superstar to sales manager or All-star player to coach doesn’t always work out. Different skill sets are required.

And so it is with educational leadership. Some make the transition well. Those that do understand that the assignment has changed:

Allyson Apsey lays down a nuclear truth bomb in her latest post. What is the job of a building-level educational leader? It’s not instructional.

I have good news for school leaders: you do not need to be an “instructional leader”.

Principals, go ahead and let out that collective sigh. You cannot be masters of best practices and pedagogy in every content area and every grade level. It is not possible, and it is not the best use of your time and influence.

Even folks who were ace teachers will be out of their depth when observing and providing actionable feedback in unfamiliar content areas. Apsey quotes researchers Rick DuFour and Mike Mattos:

“As former social studies teachers, we were not prepared to help a Spanish teacher improve when we couldn’t understand what he/she was saying. We were ill-equipped to enhance the pedagogy of an industrial arts teacher when we were mechanically inept.”

I consider myself a bit of a word nerd and a voracious reader, and I manage to get enough practice writing to string together semi-literate thoughts in this space from time to time. But I’ll never have the depth of knowledge of content to teach English/Language Arts.

And if my job was to make high-stakes judgements about content knowledge experts teaching in that area, well, I again cede the floor to Apsey:

I would often complete a teacher observation for our evaluation system and wonder how I was going to fulfill my promise to make the observation feedback valuable for the teacher. Maybe this is why research continually finds that teacher evaluation systems have zero or very little positive impact on student achievement?

So, what is the princpal’s role in elevating teaching and learning in a building? Apsey turns to a Wallace Foundation study updated in 2021. “Principals need to be leaders of not only instruction, but of the people and the organization. We cannot be just instructional leaders, there is so much more to our work.”

Apsey offers a list of “to-dos” and “to-don’ts” beginning with:

“Have conversations with teachers about instruction, not to evaluate them or give them guidance, but to learn from them as the pedagogy experts of their students. You can also use this time to understand their strengths and goals better so you can support them in their next steps.”

“Have conversations with teachers about instruction“. Woah. That would take so much of the stress and apprehension out of the evaluation season. Less “us vs. them”, more of “all of us together”.

Here’s her list of questions to drive the conversation forward:

  • What student learning are you excited about right now?
  • What instructional resource is really helping your students grow?
  • Tell me about an instructional fail you recently had, and what did you learn from it?
  • Where do you feel really strong instructionally?
  • Where are you feeling weak instructionally, and how can I support your growth?
  • What is one achievement hope you have for your students between now and the end of the quarter?

My last post-eval conference went pretty much exactly like that and it was super-valuable for both of us.

Apsey’s blog post set in motion a series of questions to myself: What if I used this checklist for self introspection? I bet that would be powerhouse self-learning. What if PLCs gathered for discussion around these questions? What if they used these questions to drive professional learning?

Now seems like as good a time as any. Let’s go.

What student learning are you excited about right now?

I loved how my class of students repeating Algebra 1A leaned in to the In-N-Out Burger 100×100 activity. The goal of that type of Three-Act Math task is to create a low barrier to entry where we can engage the question with common sense and then lay the math over the top of it. For a day early in the semester there was super-high levels of engagement in Room 247. My students found out maybe they are “better at math” than they thought. Plus it helped build a foundation for our transition to a project/problem-based learning school.

What instructional resource is really helping your students grow?

I leaned heavily on Quizizz and Desmos activities during the shutdown and remote teaching, and I find as we lurch back to “normal” that these tools allow me to combine the building blocks of an effective lesson with a seamless way for students to contribute to the discussion even if it is in pixels rather than out loud. The “snapshot” feature in AB means I can anonymously do a side-by-side of student responses to highlight different pathways to a soultion or to play “spot the error”, and with Quizizz I can build my “check for understanding” questions right in to my slides.

Tell me about an instructional fail you recently had, and what did you learn from it?

Part of being a teacher who creates many of his own materials, is that sometimes they will crash and burn spectacularly. Part of being a reflective teacher is that those are learning opportunities. There’s not really one memorable flame-out, more an occasional day where a lesson just does not land right and getting student engagement is like pulling teeth. I’ve been trying to fall back on the basics (eye contact with students, wait time), and toying with using the random student selector in Quizizz.

More on this topic later.

Where do you feel really strong instructionally?

I think a couple of areas are making me really happy right now. One is relationships. I can tell by the side conversations in class and the greetings in the hallway that my students and I are in a really good place this year. Second, my background with using #MTBoS materials had eased the transition to problem-based learning. I’ve been able to take on a bit of a leadership role in my PLN with our PrBL activities. And I think we are doing well at using media as a lesson hook (more benefits of a robust online PLN). Today to intro our ratios and proportions lesson I borrowed a video piece from Business Insider magazine.

Link

Some quality discussion ensued and the class started off understanding the concept of a scale factor.

Where are you feeling weak instructionally, and how can I support your growth?

I wish every day was like that. Reality is, I really want to be better at engaging my students in class and centering our time together around their learning and their voice. One move I made at the semester break towards that goal was rearranging the desks in my classroom, creating pods of 3-4 students. That was my go-to classroom set-up pre-pandemic, and it’s time it made its return. If they won’t talk to me, maybe they’ll talk to each other. And that’s a start.

What is one achievement hope you have for your students between now and the end of the quarter?

I hope my students get the best grades they can possibly get, can show evidence of as much learning as we can in the next three weeks before spring break, I hope my students realize how much I want them to do well, and I hope they take advantage of the opportunities thay have for quiz corrections and alternate assessments.

We’ve got the right philosophy about the evaluation process in my building. It’s about improvement and coaching and increasing student achievement. And our admins walk their talk. Post-conferences are two-way conversations where learning occurs on the part of both parties.

I wish that for all my teacher friends.

Do No Harm

I think often of one the greatest “Day Before School Starts” messages ever delivered.

That was the philosophy that made that school run, modeled by leadership. Our first and most powerful tool in any moment of conflict was de-escalation.

And it’s still true in my current building. We have probably more than our share of fights, a problem not unique to my school in this post-pandemic teaching era. There’s a whole renegade Insta account somebody made to host the videos.

My long-time philosophy is anything I can do to stop the fight from starting in the first place is better than trying to separate two kids who are already tearing into each other. In my younger days I’ve held back a 6-5, 275-lb. kid while a 6-0, 200 lb. kid threw gang signs at him from the hall. No way I want to be in-between those two when they start throwing.

And as of late I’ve stumbled across a tactic that has worked exceedingly well. Twice in two weeks I’ve had a situation where a student (not in my class) has come to my door looking to start trouble with a student who is already in my classroom. My first move is to physically place myself in between the two students. The next is to close my locked door. Now one’s in the hall, one’s inside with me, I can call for security, and the fight never happens.

Not right now anyway. I’m under no delusions that the kids are going to kiss and make up just beacuse I prevented them from punching each other in the head. In one of the recent situations while admin tried to de-escalate with the student who was outside in the hall, the girl inside my room was texting her friends for backup as she planned to jump the other girl on the way out of school. Sometimes I’m just delaying the inevitable. When the fire starts there is no “off switch”. You just have to let the flame burn out.

But at least I kept two of our students from physically hurting each other at that moment because I stood by and did nothing. That’s a big deal to me. And it helps to establish my classroom as a place where my students are safe, where I stand up for them, and where violence is not tolerated, because it is a space where learning occurs.

(Selfishly, it also helps insure I don’t end up on that IG account in the middle of an all-out brawl.)

One of my admins sent me a note earlier this year thanking me for intervening to prevent a bathroom/hallway fight from turning nasty so I feel like I’m on the right track in terms of this strategy.

In my high school days (a million years ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth) fights in the hallway were rare. That’s because they were scheduled for after school. There was a large grassy space by a railroad trestle behind the school that hosted the fights and the 200 or so kids who would show up to watch. You’d hear “meet me at the trestle” and know that it was on. That was right on my walk home and more often than not I’d stop by to watch. Not that different than my current students in that regard I guess.

I don’t necessarily know that after-school fights were any better than hallway punch-outs. No adults around to intervene in case things got out of hand. But same as in modern day times, if you’re gonna keep your grudge all the way until 3:00 probably no one was gonna keep you from fighting anyway.

We are a PBIS school so we call out and recognize positive behaviors. We’re trying to build that culture. Our admin team is making moves to try to prevent fights in the building. Whether or not they are successful, I’m going to keep trying to do what I can do to snuff things out before they start. My job is to teach math, but it’s also to keep kids safe in my classroom.

Do Your Job

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My local newspaper runs a recurring series called “My Worst Moment” featuring performers recalling times they would’ve liked to dig a hole on stage and crawl in. Joe Mantegna forgetting his lines onstage ($) at opening night of Glengarry Glen Ross in Chicago is my worst nightmare but Alison Brie’s tale is probably closer to my reality.

She recalls singing a Pat Benatar song for an audition for a musical in LA. And although she had belted it out on karaoke nights she didn’t have the voice to pull off the song in that moment. And her only day-of prep was singing along to the track in her car just before the audition.

Dudsville.

“It was such a dark moment and I think it just made me realize that if it’s something I’m afraid of doing — even for roles that don’t have singing involved but I think: I’m not right for this at all and I’ll never get it — I still want to put in the work.

“In my acting life, singing aside, I am not an under-preparer. If anything I’m an over-preparer. I do not wing it. I take it very seriously.

“I think that moment was a carry-over from high school when I was able to wing stuff. I was your classic B+ student in everything but drama — and it’s a laziness that I can’t abide by anymore, in any way. Even if you don’t get the part, at least you know you put your best foot forward. I would never want to stand in a room and have it look like I just didn’t care.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/what-to-watch/ct-ent-my-worst-moment-alison-brie-20230207-nadci6cnejaefe72glvpkiyhki-story.html

“I would never want to stand in a room and have it look like I just didn’t care”. Yep. Practically a family motto.

I was obsessive in my game prep in my radio play-by-play days, and modern-day teaching (no textbook) makes it impossible to just show up cold and go “Hey kids, do page 363 #1-33 odd in your book . And oh yeah, show your work”. Making Quizizz slides for my lessons and Desmos activities takes time and intentional planning. My dad was a steelworker for 40 years and that blue-collar mentality is in my DNA.

I was selected for a teaching policy fellowship this year. I’m part of a statewide cohort of teachers who are reading, researching, writing, and advocating in areas of education policy. Now that our state legislature is in session, that also has included virtual meetings with lawmakers. And last week eight of us traveled to Indianapolis to meet face-to-face with some of the men and women crafting legislation that will affect me, my colleagues, my students, and my building.

I’m a very large introvert and the idea of sitting across a table or standing in a hallway with state representatives and senators was kind of terrifying, honestly. But as a friend of mine used to say, a little bit of healthy fear can be a good thing.

It scared me into working hard enough to not embarrass myself.

I’d done plenty of research work in my advocacy group, focused on equitable school funding. It’s a steep learning curve and a complex subject but I was starting to feel somewhat comfortable. Turns out though that the bills we were tracking mostly involved topics from our other two working groups, on teacher recruitment and retention, and mentoring programs for new teachers and diversifying our corps of teachers in the state. That meant I could play a little more of a supporting role in the actual meetings.

Our executive director did an outstanding job of preparing us for the day. Each group worked to craft a set of talking points and a one-pager to leave with lawmakers. At our mid-year retreat we role-played meetings with legislators and specifically practiced our “ask”. She hosted a two hour prep meeting on Zoom the night before Statehouse Day, plus I followed that up with my own individual study. I researched the voting history for each lawmaker I was scheduled to meet with, and listed two or three of their current bills that I wanted to be familiar with and ask about during the meetings. Damn was I ready.

Plus the first person I bumped into (after going through security) was my own state senator who is a fellow parishioner at my church. We made small talk riding up the elevator which put me somewhat at ease.

I was far from the only one who needed reassurance on Thursday morning. My partner and I sat together to make quick plans for the ground we wanted to cover in our meetings and compare notes, and she confided to me that she felt just as off her home turf as I did. (Also: I saw her notes and her prep work and she was ready, whether she felt like it or not. That was obvious once the meetings began.)

Our director anticipated our concerns as well. Her consistent advice to us was: Your job is not to be a policy expert. Your job is to be an expert at teaching. Use that to help lawmakers understand how their proposed legislation would influence you and your students.

Bam.

I finished the day with my ED and a senior policy fellow in a wide-ranging 90-minute meeting with the chair of the House Education Committee. I held my own, asked good questions, connected dots, shared my own experiences when appropriate, and although I don’t know if I changed any minds in Indianapolis I at least came in prepared and was willing to advocate in areas that are important for the profession, now and in the future.

Small talk and networking and influencing are not my strong suits, for real. I’m a teacher, not a salesman. But with plenty of support from my group of fellows and our leadership I was able to lean into my fears and do the job I was selected to do.

That felt good.

And honestly, I use those skills at making connections and trying to influence behavior on the daily in my classroom. Just with 16-year-olds instead of powerful lawmakers. Maybe I should give myself a little more credit?

Statehouse Day was an awesome experience. It re-energized me for the remainder of the fellowship and the remainder of the school year. The fellowship has stretched me in ways I didn’t expect.

I did have one more tactic to make me feel a bit more at ease as I began the day. I selected a parking garage across the street from the Statehouse entrance that features a statue of former Indiana governor and US senator Oliver P. Morton, for whom my school is named. He is renowned for leading Indiana through the Civil War years and the immediate aftermath.

That’s pretty high praise on that plaque. And I should probably keep working on leading from my position as well.

Teach Them What They Don’t Know

Mrs. Dull facilitates the middle school youth group at our parish. I provide whatever support is required, from carrying heavy stuff to picking up pizza to writing and presenting catechetical talks. We’re in the midst of a five-part series on Catholic Social Teaching, with materials from Ascension Press. Saturday’s EDGE night focused on the dignity of life and racism. Some of the hosts have New Orleans roots, and so one of the presenters used the analogy of “gumbo pot” versus “melting pot” when talking about our diverse society and during a follow-up conversation one of our kids innocently asked “what’s gumbo?”

It hadn’t really occured to me that a person would just not know what gumbo is, but in fairness he’s like 12 and New Orleans is about 950 miles from here.

Clearly I know what we are having for dinner the session closest to Mardi Gras day.

Because teachers teach, in and out of season.

Algebra 1A started this week. A bit of a delayed start for a variety of reasons, but here we are. I took a day for expectations, so we’d all be on the same page to get my kids this credit, but I approached it in a non-traditional way. We started it by having them recall a class where they have had success or at least got the grade they wanted. I had them identify why they thought they did well in that class, and then asked if that could translate to our class.

They were very thoughtful and provided some very realistic answers.

Then I had them Iron Chef their way into the semester. What’s worked before, how could we be better this time around, can we get a credit and never have to have me as a teacher again?

On Day One there was no pressure except to be honest with themselves. How can we get from 55% to 60%? But at some point you have to do the math, sing the song, right? You can’t fake that in front of an audience.

Then on Day Two we built some culture and did some math. We’re in the midst of a transition to a New Tech school, built around project- and problem-based learning, so I wanted them to be comfortable with working with classmates, considering a single question for an entire class period, finding an un-googleable answer.

100 x 100 it is.

Not gonna lie it’s been a been a minute since I’ve taught freshmen. And freshmen have changed a little bit in the last ten or so years. Way more canny. Way more street smart. Pandemic-schooling-related? Maybe. There are some academic and some social skills that are gonna need some work. They kept me on my toes Thursday for real.

But they also dove right into how a cheeseburger is different from a double-double and how the price difference between a cheeseburger and a double-double was 90 cents and maybe we can find a pattern?

They definitely got the collaboration piece, and were open to speaking out when they saw a connection and wanted to share it with the class. The basics of where I want us to be are firmly in place.

Real talk: we never got to the part where they took that pattern they developed (the cost of an n x n at In-N-Out is a linear function) and used it to calculate the cost of a 100×100. So “did math” is kind of a relative term.

There’s time for that.

Like I told one of my babies Thursday: “Right now I just want you to be good at thinking.”

We’ll have a traditional lesson next class meeting and we’ll see how that goes. I might end up being way more Desmos activities and three-act based. Coaching them up when they stand in the spotlight with the mic. And I’m not opposed to prompting them a little bit and maybe singing along a little if it comes to that.