Productive Relationships, Effective Climates, and Classroom Communities

Chapter 13 provides a multitude of characteristics and ideas associated with creating productive learning environments; those which resonated the most for me were the relationships between teachers, students, and their role in creating effective classroom climates.

The concept of the "need for relatedness" applies not only to the teacher-student relationship, but also corresponding teacher-student-parent relationships. However, the main points to follow are tailored specifically for teacher-student interaction.

The textbook suggests that teachers:
-Regularly communicate caring and respect for students as people.
-Remember that caring and respect involve much more than simply showing.
-Work hard to improve relationships that have gotten off to bad starts.

These go hand-in-hand with concepts for climate which pose that teachers:
-Establish a goal-oriented, businesslike, yet nonthreatening atmosphere.
-Communicate and demonstrate that school tasks and academic subject matter have value.
-Give students some control over classroom activities.
-Promote a general sense of community and belongingness.

Communicating that you care for and respect students involves that students recognize that you take your job teaching seriously, that you are prepared, that you allow some student autonomy in classroom participation and activities. It is really important to me that students are empowered through their learning and feel supported and significant. I want them to develop a voice and to create an atmosphere where they feel comfortable sharing it.

"Collaborative Classroom Journals"
Encourage sharing ideas and voices in the classroom. Each journal has a specific topic, and every week the journals rotate amongst the students. As the entries begin to compile, students can read each others work and discuss with each other or just consider similarities or differences on their own. Overall, it is good for developing writing skills, encouraging creative thinking, and providing a medium of communication between students.

Journals like the ones mentioned can help create the sense of belonging, and help students reach goals in an organized, yet nonthreatening way. In terms of simple reminders of the significance of the various subjects and why they should matter to students, I think that the use inspirational posters in classrooms is effective. I used to think that most of the ones in my childhood classrooms were "cheesy", but now that I have begun considering which might be appropriate for the classroom I envision having, I am finding posters that I believe will provoke thought and motivation. I also think they will enhance the classroom's senses of  "interconnectedness", curiosity, and open-mindedness; all of which are essential aspects to the atmosphere I want in my room.

      

Motivation through the World

Motivation in classrooms is a two way street in which students and teachers have to feel interested, involved, and important. There were many contributing motivational concepts discussed in Chapter 11; of those, three stood out to me: the need for competence, need for self-worth, and the need for self-efficacy. To place these more context and in preparation for the many portfolios to come, I wanted to share some ideas I have considered for my class that would definitely encourage these three factors of motivation.

In order to be successful in any aspect of life, you must have some sense of confidence in what you  are doing. That being said, we all have to recognize that sometimes we will not have a choice but to partake in activities that force us out of our comfort zones. This is where motivation becomes essential. The chapter discusses human needs, and competence and self-worth were among the more notable. The need for competence implies that people need to believe that they can deal effectively with their environment. My plans are to one day teach in a multicultural school in a low-funded, low-achieving area, so I can empower the more vulnerable children. In this setting and others, the concept of self-worth, or protecting an individual's belief that he or she is capable and good, is intertwined with competence. As a teacher, you have to recognize that these needs are impacted by forces outside the classroom. What happens to these children at home, in the community, in the hallway, on a sports field, influences if they feel comfortable in their environment, as well as, how they feel about what they can offer in response to these experiences. 

Kid President makes reference to self-efficacy, one of the factors of motivation that I believe is of utmost importance for classrooms. First of all, teachers should enter a room believing that they can achieve certain goals or expectations. Secondly, students need to believe that they will be able to execute certain behaviors or goals. Ideally, a cohesive, productive classroom would encompass both sides. To encourage this, the chapter lists tips on how to establish a sense of self-efficacy in students. They are as follows:

• help children achieve success, especially with difficult tasks
• provide children with mechanisms for tracking progress
• avoid situations like competition which might cause children to judge themselves unfavorably against peers
• self-determination and some level of choice should be an option for children in activities

Post reading, I had to consider what is important to me and how that will influence my teaching. The text mentions that to achieve competence you have to spend time engaged in exploring and attempting to gain mastery over certain parts of your world. I definitely think that "world" is applicable to both locally and globally; I want to promote involvement, awareness, and curiosity for each.

Thackston School "Olympic" Field Day
Knoxville, Tennessee 2012

Batlang Preschool
Gaborone, Botswana 2014

I have wanderlust. I have global awareness. I have plans to travel. I have an imagination that experiences my adventures before I reach their destination.
I want to share this with the students that I encounter while teaching. I want them to feel like they could go or be anywhere they wish one day. I want them to know enough about other places to know where they are drawn. I want their imaginations to take them to swim with elephants in Thailand, to eat quesadillas in local markets in Mexico, to gaze in Norway at the magnificent Northern Lights.

I mostly want to reinforce to them that where they are does not have to be forever and that what they feel other children may feel, too, from around the world. I want them to dream, to innovative, and to be worldly.

It is also very important that when they walk into my classroom they feel like anything could happen that day, anything is possible, and that the world that is my classroom, is connected to, but not the same as the world they encounter at home. They can escape and feel safe, if needed, in my room.




A few ideas I am inspired by and likely to implement are:

 Reading materials that allow students to learn more on their own. This is where self-determination is key because they have a choice in what horizons they want to broaden.

As a supplement to their readings (and would also be a nice reference for other actives or core subjects), a board like this will likely be in my future room. It is a "reading takes you places" board and as the class reads, we pin where their books are set.

I think that this would be helpful in helping visualize where they are in reference to other parts of the world. It will also help them to connect cultural, environmental, etc. similarities and differences from specific regions and just around the world in general.

 Finally, I think that a board dedicated to little facts would be interesting to relate to throughout different lessons. As well as, provide and interesting facts for students to share with each other, think about, etc. I also think that posters like those to the left would be great for inspiration and encouragement.

Raising Teacher Expectations for Achievement

One of the concepts covered in Chapter 15, was the concern or issue of cultural bias and discrimination within testing. Native Indian, African American, and Central and Latin American students tend to be the populations most effected by this. As a result, many students fall into the "stereotype threat" early in their educational careers, believing that they will perform poorly when assessed because traditionally their groups do perform poorly. I wanted to address some concerns I have with the education system and the expectations of teachers in low-income, low-acheiving schools which also influence how these students perform on tests. In addition, I would like to provide an example of how the new Common Core standardization is being implemented in the Native community to reinforce and maintain tribal languages and tradition.

First let me discuss the implementation of No Child Left Behind in 2001. It mandated high-stake tests and accountability in public schools at primary and secondary levels; and it also incentivized improvement by offering bonuses and increased funding in schools that showed progress. Those schools who did not show progress, however, were sanctioned, corrective policies were instituted, and students were given the option to attend a better public school at the district's expense. The policy meant well, but it fell short of initial expectations and in some ways was detrimental to the way coursework was emphasized and encouraged teachers to push students through schooling before they mastered certain skills necessary to succeed at higher levels. In 2010, the documentary Waiting for Superman came out, and it exposed some of the issues with this policy for students in lower-income communities and lower-achieving schools.

This film provides evidence of NCLB leaving children behind in lower-performing schools; these schools and students are predominately from minority families and communities. The statistics of students who enter some of the high schools versus those who actually graduate from the schools are baffling, and one of the issues that the film raises is that teachers are not the only influential component to these failing schools. Another concern is the communities the schools are located in, and the outside factors contributing to student interest. The schools struggling the most with return rates, test scores, and maintaining a consistent staff, are those in low-income areas and they are critically overlooked because of the minorities that populate the student bodies. Furthermore thanks to NCLB, the students at these schools should have the option to attend better public schools; unfortunately the ratio of students in need of transfers and number of better schools is disproportionate, leading to a lottery system that provides only a lucky few the opportunity for better education. In addition to location and socio-economics, the teachers staffed at these schools are frequently not as experienced, devoted, and in some cases even lack basic teaching qualification.

One leading frustration for me with our education system is that we keep trying to push for a raise in standards and student expectations, yet we still fall short with regards to expectations of teachers. There is a section of the chapter that focused on cultural bias in exams and what groups were most likely to experience it. Before we can address bias in testing, I think we have to first address the clear discrimination against minorities and the quality of their instruction in comparison to higher-income, predominately white schools. The article we read for this week mentions that schools with higher test scores are staffed with teachers who have taught for longer periods of time in the districts. These are teachers who have devoted careers, even if they have transferred schools, to providing adequate instruction for their students. The middle and higher income school districts tend to have an easier time keeping teachers in their classrooms and in the profession. They have more resources, a more easily motivated student body, so success in reaching the standards is fairly simple as long as they stay on course and at pace throughout the year. They make reaching the standards look simple, but here's the thing, THEY SHOULD. Their pursuit in higher education was to become effective instructors; they have access to resources, know how to improvise, plan the lessons, and motivate students. It makes sense that school districts who largely employ these teachers are successful. In contrast though, are the low-income districts lagging behind in performance and long-term teacher employment. As a future educator, one detrimental and frustrating contributors to this high teacher burn-out rate is Teach for America. This program is well-intentioned in theory, but one of the most crucial problems I have with it is that when you visit the "Who We Look For" page on their cite; they claim, "Some corps members were educators prior to joining, but many do not have any prior experience in the education field"(teachforamerica.org). Now let's consider this in comparison to Doctors Without Borders, which specifies as a "General Requirement" that participants must have at least two years of prior relevant professional experience. We do not allow individuals lacking the education and experience in the medical field to work as nurses and doctors in voluntary medical organizations, so why do we allow volunteers with no prior teaching experience or expertise to teach in our schools? Also, if the highest scores are seen in districts with long-term teachers, how is hiring unqualified people under two-year contracts a reasonable and effective solution to declining student return rates and disappointing test scores? Even worse is that we do not place these people in high-performing schools from middle and upper class districts, but rather, in the schools with low-test scores in low-income districts. Not only does this further inhibit the ability to succeed academically for these students, but also perpetuates the stereotype threat in these districts. First of all, these students have stress unrelated to school (financial, social, etc.) that students in higher classes at the same ages do not necessarily consider. Second of all, they have unqualified teachers; potentially participating in Teach for America under two-year contracts. Two-year contracts that devalue the importance of professional careers in education by allowing other professionals to "dip their toes" into the system before they start their "real jobs". How are those attitudes towards minorities' education supposed to encourage performance from students from discriminated and disadvantaged communities? If anything, it internalizes racism more than ever. 

Here is a link to these websites if you wish to know more:
http://www.teachforamerica.org/ 
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/

To conclude, I would like to look at how more recent Common Core standards can be implemented to  empower minority groups in the US and provide sustainable improvement to low-achieving districts. In New Mexico, the Jemez tribal group is working with their local Head Start program to teach the common core requirements and incorporate their tribe's traditions and language into the teaching curriculum. In doing so, the native community will be empowered by reintroducing their traditions, languages, and values to their acculturated youth. Kevin Shendo, education director for the Pueblo of Jemez closes with, "The common-core standards are what we are challenging our children to learn, but how can we expect them to master the content if it has little relevance to their life experiences and communities? Through the ways we implement the standards, as educators and leaders, we have the opportunity to honor the rich history of this country and the diversity which makes us all unique" (Shendo, "Common Core From a Tribal Perspective"), and I believe that his creativity, devotion, and enthusiasm for improving education for minorities and the push for "policies of empowerment" are what we need to see more of with regards to teachers and teaching before we can raise the standards of academic performance and expectations of our students.

Here is the link to the Jemez education article:
http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2013/12/04/13shendo.h33.html

Assessment Strategies

One of my concerns with our discussion of assessment strategies is the issue of informal versus formal evaluations and the validity and reliability of one or the other. I would be interested in further analyzing which best reflects the effectiveness or success of teaching methods and how engaged students are in class at the college level.

Consider these two students:

Student A: Shows up for class, does the reading, engages in class discussion, and could easily write an essay on the spot, in the moment, on the material being discussed on any particular day.

Student B: Shows up for class, looks at Pinterest, posts to Instagram, plans the next football tailgate, reads only if a quiz is hinted, and plans to cram weeks worth of course material into 8 hours of studying the night before the exam. 

I can admit that there have been a few classes in my college career that I have been Student B. I skated through the courses, and I could hardly tell you about my instructor or the content I studied. Yet, I passed with an A's or B's and based on those tests I "mastered" the skills or materials expected of me. 

I have more often, however, been Student A; and if asked to,  I could write an opinionated essay,  supported fairly accurately from class texts, films, and discussions on most days in class. I stress essays here because I think that with Global Studies courses, especially, where the content of the courses are meant to make connections or comparisons, essays are more effective ways to assess. In addition, I believe that essay exams at this level can reflect and benefit those who think more critically and those who tend towards more creativity. 

The discussion required for an informal essay type of exam would allow for a more authentic analysis of what students are grasping, and it also would allow more freedom to fulfill every level of Bloom's taxonomy. I think that more of a push for examination like this at higher levels in education would encourage students to engage more in class and strive to establish more concrete understandings of the material taught in their courses. As opposed, the methods of examination currently in place, which promote many students to behave like Student B the majority of their time in school, and then regurgitate once the material they learn within only the few hours or days prior to the scheduled exam.

I understand the purpose of formal exams and of variations in exam formatting, but I think that in many of the social science and humanities courses I have taken the last few years it would have been more reflective of student engagement and knowledge to have more frequent informal exams that allowed for in-depth reflection.