What can I say to my students?

I cannot stop thinking about the families, teachers, students and all the townspeople of Newtown, CT.  There can be no justice, no meaning made.

Now the question that wakes me: What can I say to my students?

Death is not unfamiliar to most of them.  One eighth grade student just uncovered his brother's dead body in bed last month after a drug overdose.  He was absent for three or four days, and when he returned he was eerily "normal," just a bit hyper-focused on his work.  As the weeks have passed, Dylan's grip on himself has continued to slip.  He cannot sit still.  He runs and jumps into the reading corner bean bag chairs, throwing a pink one overhead while the rest of the students looked on from their group work, annoyed.  I've been quietly reminding them to be patient with him, but how can they fully understand his grief?  How can I gently help him cope in class, beyond linking him with the appropriate trained psychologists and counselors outside of my classroom?

So many students, so much pain.  Some are not very well cared for, in dirty clothes, with unwashed hair and darting eyes.  So many in foster care or living with aunties and grandparents.

And now this.

How will I start the conversation in a way that is sensitive, gentle, productive, healthy?  How else would an ELA teacher proceed?  Books.

A professor of mine at the University of Kentucky's Library and Information Science program introduced me to the field of bibliotherapy.  Books can help start healing conversations with students, as well as help them cope with the myriad issues with which they struggle.  One caveat though, exemplified in the case of my student Dylan, is that the student must be ready to cope with the issue.  If not, they might react negatively to the book I give them, as it might force them to acknowledge a pain they're avoiding.

Still, for tragic events that affect all of us, I think it's important to start the conversation, because the kids are going to have a lot of questions.  One blogger who has been through tragedies with her students, including witnessing a suicide and 9/11, writes of success using Charlotte's Web with her kindergartners to help them cope with these tragedies.

Of course my early adolescents need something with more grit.  I found a list of school shooting books on GoodReads, and I just ordered Columbine by Dave Cullen and Shooter by Walter Dean Myers from the local public library.  I'll share this student review of Teen Ink, and when I go pick the books up form the library, I'll ask for picture books about grief to start the conversation.

After a tragedy like this, my first thought is, how can I help my students?  My second thought is how can we, as a society and as teachers, prevent such tragedies from recurring?  While some make the case for the rarity of mass public shooting, that it happens at all should be an impetus for prevention.

William Glaverson of the New York Times writes an important piece on the difficult questions we ask after such a tragedy.  Apparently, in all or most of the public massacres in the last twenty years, the mad men (and they have nearly all been men, and all mentally ill) have made numerous "cries for help" before they committed their murders.  I believe the social stigmatization of mental illness, particularly for men in our nation, is partly to blame.  If only they could receive mental health treatment as easily as they could acquire automatic weapons.

On the front end, teachers and adults in the community can and should do more to support the emotional well being of all their students.  It is easy to ignore the loners, the boys who eat lunch alone, who face ridicule, who are unwell, especially if they don't cause class disruptions.  We must take the time to reach out to them, to their parents, and to get them the mental health services they may need early, before more fall victim to the violent expression of pain endured to the breaking point of the mentally ill.

What can I say to my students?  How about, "Are you okay?"

Common Core Help

Because Kentucky was the first state to roll out (and assess at all grade levels, yikes!) the new Common Core State Standards, Kentucky teachers are hip to the shifts and challenges of implementing these more rigorous standards.  After a year and a half of working with them, I definitely believe they will improve public education.

For one of my library science classes I created a pathfinder -- an electronic research assistant. I created this one on Google Sites to assist K-12 classroom teachers seeking information on the new common core state standards.  It's a great resource for anyone who has questions about the standards and how to implement them.

Words that are Worth their Weight

One thing I love about teaching, is how you get to start fresh each August and revise the work of the year before.  This year, I took my old idea of an interactive word wall (credit to Janet Allen, of course!), and revised it to include the three tiers of vocabulary instruction.

Tier 1 Vocabulary
Tier 1 words are basic, common sight words.  Simple, single-meaning words like "good" or "dog" or "sad" or "sit." Dr. Seussy words that are critical vocabulary for younger students and emerging readers. For middle school students, however, Tier 1 words make for pretty lousy writing.  Thus, the Tier 1 words have become our "'Bad' Words." 

Tier 1 Vocabulary

Early in the year, we discuss what makes precise writing. As kids use "he" or "it" vaguely, I redirect them to be more specific about who or what they're writing or talking about. They "find a better word" and hang the "bad word" on the wall for future reference. From there, they love to listen for bad words and help keep each other (and me!) precise and clear.

Tier 2 Vocabulary
These words are part of the general academic language that opens doors for students.  I used to call them SAT words when I was their age.  Since the student population I teach isn't as obsessed with the SAT as we preppy little Catholic school students were, I now call them "Money Words" in my classroom.  These words are "rich," in that they are specific and enrich writing.  They're also "five-dollar words," and most importantly, they are the words the acquisition of which will provide my students with better, more lucrative opportunities. 

Tier 2 Vocabulary

These are words my students find in their reading throughout the year.  When they don't know the meaning of a word, they use context clues, roots, the dictionary and me to access the meaning of the word.  As they learn new, more precise, rich words, they write them on these sticky sentence strips and post them on our word wall.  Students enjoy the kinesthetic aspect of this routine, and they compete to see who can post the most Money Words.  Not only do they enjoy adding to the word wall, they also refer to it as they write to get ideas and inspiration to enliven their word choice.

Tier 3 Vocabulary
These are domain-specific words.  So, in biology "mitosis" and "nucleus," and in math "slope" and "algorithm."  These words aren't widely used and don't necessarily provide much capital beyond their field.  Tier 3 words are still important to each content area, however, for accessing, processing, understanding, discussing and reflecting on the content.

Tier 3 Vocabulary

As we learn literary terms, literacy skills, or discuss unfamiliar terminology of the study of English language arts, students write down the words and post them for later reference and review. 

Tier 3 used to be the main focus of ELA vocabulary instruction.  With the new Common Core Standards, however, has come vocabulary revolution.  The Common Core shifts in ELA and math are pushing instruction to more rigorous realms.  Where we used to teach domain-specific vocabulary nearly exclusively, we now teach students to mine complex texts for rich, multi-layered academic language.  The emphasis on the subtleties and the multi-faceted, organic nature of language pushes students beyond the rote memorization of words like "metaphor" and "synecdoche" to understanding the ways in which authors use words to play with language and make deep, real meaning. 

The shift from Tier 3 to Tier 2 is so much more than new vocabulary lists.  It's a move BEYOND vocabulary lists to deep analysis and acquisition of powerful words that can empower students.

Don't Hesitate...Annotate!

It's been a minute since I've written, but I'm excited to be back and ready to share my lesson plans, ideas, student work and general musings. So get ready!

This year has been an exciting change. I'm back to work full time after taking a year "off" at half-time teaching and going to school to pursue my Masters in Library and Information Science at the University of Kentucky.  I'm now teaching two class of eighth grade ELA, taking my last two MLIS courses, and serving as the literacy resource lead for my school.  So I've got a bit on my plate, but I wouldn't have it any other way!

Westport Middle School, where I teach, is an amazing place. The faculty is inspiring, talented and hard working. The culture is positive, inclusive and student-oriented. But we certainly have our challenges - 70% of our kids qualify for government-subsidized lunches. Many of our most disadvantaged kids are bussed thirty minutes each way, which makes it difficult for parents who may not have easy access to transportation to get to the school to get involved under either negative or positive circumstances. We deal with the many issues that plague kids in poverty every day. But our school is changing.

Thus far, the data have not given testament to our hard work and the softer gains we "feel" we've made.  Here in Kentucky, we were the first to roll out the new Common Core State Standards last year. All students were tested on the CCSS last year with a test created by Pearson called the KPREP. When the scores came out last month, we were definitely disappointed. After a brief dip into dispair, we pulled ourselves up by the proverbial bootstraps and began to recallibrate.

• Positive school culture? Check.
• Committed and skilled faculty? Check.
• Supportive and encouraging leadership? Check

All these items were in place last year.  At the beginning of this year, we'd installed a few more necessary systems and structures.

• School-wide behavior plan? Check.
• Time during the day to collaborate in Professional Learning Communities? Check. 

So what were we lacking?  (For one, a highly refined and functional RtI system, but we're still working on that.) One thought kept plaguing me: the kids can't read.  What could I do in my role as half-time literacy resource to really affect change?  What could be done school-wide that would be effective and garner teacher buy in?

Why, annotation, of course!

Earlier in the year, my colleague Jenny Napier suggest having the 8th graders read and annotate Kelly Gallagher's Article of the Week.  While not every kid turned in their homework (shocker!), many were starting to get the hang of annotating to record their thinking.  We encouraged kids to annotate everything we read in language arts: to circle unknown words, to underline and star important ideas, to mark confusing parts with a question mark, and to write notes in the margins.

Kelly Gallagher's Articles of the Week

We realized many of our kids were sitting quietly at their desks, not causing any problems to get attention, and....not reading.  Annoatation actually forced them to engage with a text in a meaningful way, record their thinking so that in two seconds I could see if they were actually reading or not.

I wondered if the problem of passive non-reading was endemic or school wide?  Was the problem that our many kids who came to us below grade level in sixth grade were continuing to fall farther and farther behind because they simply were not reading??

In several classrooms I visited I saw the same things: teachers reading difficult texts aloud.  And many kids listening...but not reading.  By not having time to struggle with texts, kids weren't getting the experiences they needed to build reading stamina and confidence.  The first difficult texts they were given to read individually all last year may have even been the KPREP texts!  No wonder we didn't soar.

So, with the blessing of my esteemed principal, Dr. Staci Eddleman, we rolled out our first school-wide literacy initiative: ANNOTATION.

Teachers were encouraged to give kids time to struggle with difficult texts on their own first, and then to support them. 

Kids were required to annotate EVERY text they read, in every single subject from math to the humanities.  Different subjects taught annotation differently, but the main thing was everybody got on board. 

And the kids....hated it.  But they hate broccoli too, right?

How to annotate word problems in math class

Annotating in science

Student annotations decorate the halls at Westport

And we've begun to see results. In my PLC alone, our diagnostic index was around 50% proficiency last September.  We set our SMART goal at 75% and just got our results - each of the five teachers met or exceeded our goal, a success we attribute simply to requiring our students to annotate.