Month: March 2023

Road Trip

We are three-quarters of the way through the school year and almost halfway though my building’s conversion to a project-based learning model. From the jump it’s been a team effort, planning together and taking turns suggesting activities. This unit one of my geometry colleagues was struck with a PrBL inspiration at a faculty meeting and quickly worked up a rough draft of an activity to share. I went and tweaked it a little (because we collaborate like that) and away we go.

Because Spring Break seems like an ideal time for an Imaginary Road Trip.

Our kids began by locating Hammond on the map, then identifying two other cities they have lived in, have visited, have family in, want to visit, know from music or movies or books, whatever.

They placed points on the map for each city, connected the dots, and then measured out the straight-line distance between each city. Using the scale on the map, they wrote and solved a proportion to find the mileage.

Cool. But roads between cities don’t typically go in straight lines. So off to Google maps we go to find the actual driving distance.

We grooved to wide-open spaces driving tunes while we worked.

Next up, let’s attach some real-ish world math to our project. I grabbed up some data from my last cross-country trip to see my Army MP son and had them write and solve proportions to determine how many gallons of gas they’d need for the trip and how much they would spend on fuel. We wrapped it up with my kids calculating the average cost of a gallon of gas on this trip, and their miles per gallon.

My geometry students are part of that cohort that spent their formative algebra years either learning remotely or wearing masks in rows and columns in class, and many tell me they feel shaky still when it comes to the Xs and Os of algebra 1. That’s fine. It’s always been my job to find those gaps and help fill them in. So if we beat proprtions to death these last few weeks, trust me when I say we needed to.

Spring break is here. I know because I stretched out for just like five minutes after dinner yesterday and woke up an hour later when there was just enough light coming through the window that I wasn’t 100% sure if it was 7:00 pm or 7:00 am the next morning.

I needed to find the juvenation machine. For that purpose, ain’t but one place to go. Or maybe two.

Mrs. Dull told me I seemed very relaxed at River St. Joe. It’s that obvious…

Never happier than I’m I’m by water. It was good to be on my feet and moving, good to be by myself, good to hear frogs and birds and leaves and nature sounds (and I am the king of loving trucks and busses and horns and city sounds).

Much needed.

But even in the midst of My Happy Place™, math is never faw away.

“What do you notice? What do you wonder?

Sometime in the next couple of days I’ll post my quarter grades, make sure work clothes are clean and gas tank is full and lunches are prepped. But until then I can squeeze in a road trip or two. Imaginary or otherwise.

Teacher Voice

When I applied for the Indiana Teach Plus Policy Fellowship last spring I really had no belief that I would actually be selected for the position. And then, upon my selection, I had no idea what I was really getting into.

I knew I would be be reading and researching and writing and meeting with policymakers/legislators and advocating for positions in the education space, but what did that really mean?

Our state legislature is in the second half of its session, when the 1500 or so bills in the two chambers have been whittled down to a more manageable number for debate and consideration and all the groups that advocate at the Statehouse can start to narrow their focus.

It’s the time when my executive director is gently nudging us to write op-ed pieces on the topics we’ve been researching. And if not writing 800-word thinkpieces, at least crafting testimony before the House or Senate Education Committees. I’m a good 2.5 hour drive from the state capital and I’m not sure I can sneak away this week for an in-person testimony, so the written word will have to suffice.

So here I am. Following a virtual meeting of my Equitable Funding Advocacy work group tonight, I crafted a first draft of written testimony on the biennial budget bill, in particular focusing on the proposed expansion of my state’s voucher program (known as the “Choice Scholarship Program”) to families making 400% of the threshhold for free/reduced price lunch.

Here we go:

Steve Dull

Senate Education Committee

Written Testimony

HB 1001

Voucher Expansion

My name is Steve Dull and I am a math teacher at Oliver P. Morton High School in Hammond, and an Indiana Teach Plus Policy Fellow. I am the parent of two graduates of Indiana public high schools, one of whom followed my path of attending a Catholic grade school until eighth grade. 

I have taught students in urban and suburban districts, in Las Vegas as well as in Indiana. I have served as a member of my Parish Pastoral Council. I appreciate the opportunity to submit testimony in regards to the Choice Scholarship Program. 

Catholic schools have a long history in our country of serving the most marginalized students: European immigrants in the 19th century to children of color experiencing poverty in the late 20th century. And within the last two decades leaders in the state of Indiana have seen fit to make public funds available to families who wish to offer their children a Catholic education but struggle to pay the tuition required to attend parish schools.

I can relate: for a few years while my wife and a partner were attempting to launch a non-profit matching middle school girls with STEM industry mentors, we provided for our family of four on a public school teacher’s salary. And yes, we made use of our diocesan tuition support program (funded by collections in parishes across Lake, Porter, LaPorte, and Starke counties) in those years. My oldest son, now a United States Army MP, qualified for reduced price lunch and the 21st Century Scholars program.

If we agree the Choice Scholarship Program is an appropriate use of public funds, can we also agree that a means test is appropriate to determine who should be eligible to use public funds to attend private schools? 

The Indiana Constitution requires that the state provide, “by law, for a general and uniform system of Common Schools, wherein tuition shall be without charge, and equally open to all”.

So we have a conflict. The desire to provide school choice, especially to our most marginalized families, with our constitutional mandate to provide a uniform system of schooling, free and open to all.

Opening the Choice Scholarship to families making up to 400% of the federal poverty level is a move we cannot afford to make. That is an annual income of $200,000 per year, or more than three times the median household income in our state.

Only 4.5% of Indiana families exceed this income threshold yet we are willing to take dollars away from the schools serving 19 of every 20 Hoosier children to provide scholarship money to the top 5 percent of earning families in our state. My school serves a population that is 85% historically marginalized and 74% economically disadvantaged. Our teachers and staff are rock stars and bring their A Game every day but serving a population in economic need requires support, and that requires funding.

The Indiana Capital Chronicle notes that “After the expansion, the program would cost the state an estimated $500 million in fiscal year 2024, and another $600 million in the following fiscal year.” This is more than double the current outlay for the Choice Scholarship program.

There is no magic pile of money in Crown Point, or Indianapolis, or Washington. This expansion of the Choice Scholarship is excessive. We can provide school choice to our families in need, especially our families of color, without taking funds away from the schools that serve our families in need who opt for a public education.

I’m hopeful my senior policy fellow and my executive director will provide gentle yet incisive suggestions for edits.

And since the written testimony should be around 450 words or two spoken minutes and an op-ed is targeted at 750-800 words, I may have a publishable piece when my colleagues are done with it. I’d love to do more than just shout into the wind.

More importantly, I hope I am able to contribute to the conversation around how public education is funded (and valued) in my state.

Wish me luck. Wish us all luck.

Teaching To The Student

Source

Today is the first day of Daylight Saving Time. It is unquestionably Mrs. Dull’s least favorite day of the year. For her that lost hour of sleep is a thing she can never get back and it feels like its been unfairly taken, the same reaction you have as a kid to dropping an ice cream cone on the ground.

For me, it’s one of the unmistakable markers of the coming of spring. Truth be told, I’ll be dragging tomorrow morning too but there’s a 7:00 sunset scheduled for Monday of spring break and that re-energizes me for the last 9 weeks of school. I’m very Vitamin D-responsive. I’m more motivated to get my dogs and myself out for evening walks when it’s light out later. I’ll put the patio chairs back out and spend some quiet time sitting outside after dinner. It’s mentally and physically healthy for all of us.

Everybody out there trying to get what they need, and some folks need something different. For Cath, we’ll balance out the sleep deprivation some night soon with an impromptu pizza dinner on the beach at sunset.

My district revealed its testing numbers a few weeks ago. There was good news and bad news: we are improving but still lagging the state-wide average. And breaking down our students’ I-Ready and PSAT results, we have got significant work to do.

Our principal shared out the results at last month’s faculty meeting, and added a note of guidance: if we have a large portion of our students reading at well below grade level, and we are giving text-based assessments, we can’t be too surprised that our students are struggling grade-wise in our classes. His suggestion: can we consider and implement other ways we can give our students to show us what they know?

Amen. Preaching to the choir right there.

I’m a long-time project-as-assessment guy. Especially when Algebra II gets weird.

Last week we finished triangle similarity and took a Desmos quiz on the topic, with so-so results. I followed it up with the Capture-Recapture goldfish lab and made that a quiz grade. It checks plenty of my favorite boxes: collaborative, crunching numbers, real-world application, a quick snack while mathing. They are after all The Snack That Smiles Back™.

If you want the definitive write-up and docs, Julie Reulbach is my go-to. And you’ll probably dig the BBC video that serves as the hook.

There was some quality math on display and plenty of productive table-talk, and a little competition (which group came closest to the actual number of goldfish in the bag) never hurts.

They showed me they can set up and solve proportions, which is a major objective for the unit. That was my motivation for making it a quiz grade. As a former colleague of mine likes to say, “you learn it, you earn it”. For many of my students, it helped balance out their score on the more traditional quiz. Which seems eminently fair to me, and is aligned with the philosophy our school leadership is espousing.

Win-win. I can teach to the test, or I can teach to the student.

Kind of an easy decision, as I understand it.

Now let’s make it throught this last week of the quarter, enjoy spring break, light the Weber and bathe in the soft light of a late-March sunset.

That’s Affirmative – TLB4 x Natural Helpers

My teacher self-talk in the moments before the first bell each day is usually a “You got this. Let’s go.”, a deep breath and exhale, and a Hail Mary. Sometimes with a little of the Crash Davis discourse mixed in. (somewhat NSFW):

And, as Crash probably knows well, sometimes that positive self-talk still ends up in Strike Three.

Doesn’t stop him tho. Or me.

This past weekend in my teaching world was session five of the IDOE’s Teacher Leader Bootcamp & the Natural Helpers retreat in a snowstorm with 50 or so truly great kids. It was a long three days but super-productive. A couple of kids came up to me on the last day and said they wished our school was like this every day. That’s the culture we want. And they are the kids who will plant the seeds of positive change. I’m psyched to see it.

Thursday after school started with a 2.5 hour video call for TLB4. This session focused on the principal’s role in school improvement. Creating a safe environment and a culture that makes teachers feel respected and valued. Our presenter shared some research findings that Allyson Apsey also referenced in her recent post – that teacher evaluation systems have almost zero effect on student achievement, yet in many buildings they are used as a tool to punish rather than to create a culture of coaching and improvement. The University of Chicago’s UChicago Impact found that strong building admin leadership was second only to quality of teaching in its effect on student achievement.

In my small group discussion we shared stories of our building leaders supporting their staff and not only listening to teacher concerns but also acting on their recommendations. Some of the reading material though indicated that in many buildings teachers rarely hear that they are valued.

What would just a few positive words mean? We all know how we react when we are told something complimentary.

Then it was off to the Indiana Dunes for the retreat. Part of the Natural Helpers program on day two is spent on affirmations. (Stuart Smalley get out of my head). One of our facilitators related his experience as a manager and his personal belief how important it is to let people know that they are important to the company’s goals – “I’m glad you’re here and we want you to stay with us”. How many teachers get to hear that? I do. And I’ll tell you: It matters, for real.

For adults, and for kids.

What would that mean for my kids to hear it in my classroom? I can tell you from personal experience it matters to them.

I’m teaching a class this semester for students who are repeating Algebra 1A. I told them right from jump that it was my goal for every one of them to get this credit, and that all of them had the abilities to do that. That was a good start. But I definitely got their attention about a week and a half ago. I gave them the heads-up that we are entering unannounced evaluation season, and that there was a possibility an administrator might walk in to our class some day, grab a seat, and observe me.

I also told them (borrowing a line from a brilliant former colleague and fellow second-career teacher) that I’m too old to stress over evaluations. My door is literally open almost every class period (and 24/7 figuratively), and I feel like I check the boxes for preparation and content and delivery that are assessed on our rubric. So I told my kids I don’t need to put on a dog and pony show when an admin walks in. I’m going to be me. And I told them I want the same thing from them – they don’t need to pretend to be someone they are not, that I want them to be unapologetically themselves. Then I said “I love you just as you are.” And you should have seen the heads snap around.

Source

I had their attention for sure at that moment. Kids that fail classes and occasionally run into discipline problems probably have a strong self-belief that they are not the kids that teachers love. That is a misconception.

(And no shade on my colleagues. This isn’t a “they never heard that in class before” thing. I know they have. Because teachers who don’t love our kids are not going to last long in our building.)

I’ve had to run a little tighter ship in that hour classroom-management-wise because there are a lot of kids who are not engaged with algebra, or let’s be honest, with school, but the group as a whole has definitely buckled down when they see that I’m working to create an environment where learning can occur but also that I respect them as I do it.

Super-important thing is that has to be real. Fake it till you make it? Won’t work. I can’t sit in front of my kids and blow smoke – I need to be real and authentic with compliments and affirmations.

When the relationship is real, kids feel open in sharing what they need from teachers. I sat with one group at dinner during the retreat Friday night, heard them out, and was able to bring one of our instructional coaches into the conversation and make a recommendation for a Student Advisory Council on Academics. My building has a general student advisory council already so maybe they’ll be able to push the ball forward there.

Student leaders. Student voice. Hooo was that a powerhouse half-hour or so.

One last thing. Some of the kids at the retreat told us they already use positive self-talk in class, before a test or a presentation – “You are smart. You studied. You prepared. You are ready. You got this.”

Yes. Yes they do.

A weekend surrounded by teacher leaders, and student leaders. I’ll take a few dozen more weekends just like that.