Saturday, May 18, 2013

Okay, I'm a little delirious. I've been grading off and on for about 10 hours. STILL, there are two things making everything seem a little clearer: my "Feelin' Good" playlist, which includes Mumford & Sons, Kid Cudi, Matt + Kim, and Jackson Browne #judgemeicandeal, and Mike Schmoker's book Focus: Elevating the Essentials to Radically Improve Student Learning. Schmoker's book looks all serious and boring on the outside but is, thus far, a down-to-earth, quick read that addresses the anxieties most teachers are having about the nature of public education today. And, let me tell you, it is helping me to NOT have a panic attack in terms of all the things we're facing. According to Schmoker,we can do it, guys, we just need to simplify... which I think is what Thoreau stressed a long time ago... but, then, he wasn't a public educator, was he? He was a dude who lived by himself, in the middle of nowhere, a dude who was NOT surrounded by constant chaos and mandates, so let's give ourselves a break for JUST now figuring it out.

I think the craziest thing about Schmoker's book, thus far, is that the suggestions he is positing for public education sound a WHOLE FLIPPIN' LOT like what we did when I was a student at a CLASSICAL school. *Gasp!* What?! Classical models are now moving to public school? We're just gonna read and read and write and write in a beautiful, simple way, and children will learn in the normal, not-so-new-fangled way? Maybe. According to Schmoker, we need to avoid all the glitz and glam that comes with new program and that new initiative. Can we keep our focus long enough, pedagogues? I might be too young to have this much cynicism towards the people who make decisions, but srrsly, these are the same individuals who have passed every other plan.

Now, if this were something that I could accomplish by myself, I'd just go rogue, read a bunch of books, and come up with my own plans. According to Schmoker, there is one teacher who made significant gains in his classroom following that model, but aren't we SO much stronger together than alone? So, we need to have each other's backs, to support one another--'cause heaven knows, this scatterbrained girl is NOT infinitely creative to the degree that she can come up with common this and common that all by herself. I'm re-thinking so many things about my approach to the classroom, and, if Schmoker's right, I might just be able to do what  love, which is just straight-up teachin', and be REALLY effective at my job---sayyyy waaaaaaat?! You heard me. That's what he has said in the first two-point-five chapters.

 

These claims sound really good. Too good. Look at me; I'm such a little cynic. So, I'm off to finish another set of tests and then read another chapter. I'll keep you updated.

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