Rocks

Balance. I wish there was a meditation emoji.

NCTE and Teacher Allies

NCTE

NCTE is an awesome resource for various reasons. It’s college organizations prepare future teachers for the world of education, and its website offers ideas by teachers to help other teachers improve their craft. What I didn’t know, though, was that NCTE has a forum where teachers can give advice on how to include every student in the room with the learning at hand. If you go onto the website’s homepage, you can type anything into the search bar and a list of forum posts and resources will appear. This feature not only gives advice on how to help female students, but also how female teachers can feel empowered in their classrooms.

Organizations

Public Allies

Public Allies is a nationally-ranked system of supports for students who did not feel successful in a systematic, cookie-cutter school setting. This program gets young people involved in the education of kids who really do want to learn, but also want hands-on leadership experience. This program focuses on diversity and inclusion, integrity, focus on assets, collaboration, continuous learning, and innovation. I can’t help but think of Connected Learning when I see this model because it shares many of the same values. This program not only encourages students to embrace their learning through exploration, but it also encourages students to embrace their individuality, which is not a comment sentiment in the public school system. I believe that looking at organizations such as this for guidance could really help the education system cater to the needs of its diverse population.

DAVA

The Downtown Aurora Visual Arts program’s mission is to strengthen the community through the visual arts with youth engagement as the primary focus. This organization assigns value to arts in education. They believe that scaffolding education with the arts. Having worked with the Boys and Girls’ Club of America, I see a lot of parallels drawn between these two organizations, Both believe in providing a safe, community-driven environment where students can feel valued. I think that the arts are a very important aspect of a child’s development that we often neglect in the public education system, especially in low-income communities. This organization strives to bring art into a diverse community of people from all backgrounds.

Nicole Mirra

Nicole Mirra was a high school english in New York City, curious about how civic engagement would impact students. she got her PhD at UCLA and joined the National Writing Project before becoming a college professor.

There have been teachers who have been doing Connected Learning, though it wasn’t called Connected Learning. It’s honestly just good teaching. Make content relevant and engaging with real lives. Peer supported work. In 2010, Nicole started working with teachers mostly and started to develop the idea of Connected Learning. What does it mean to prepare teachers for Connected Learning?

“New and Multi-Modal Literacies.” This concept means that new literacies should be integrated, not isolated, even in training. Public education is afraid of Connected Learning. Give teachers a chance to play with different tools that are NOT for education and ask how they could be used for an educational purpose.

Youth Participant Action Research– young people can be the producers of knowledge, instead of just the gatherer of knowledge. Creating their own studies and collecting heir own primary sources. Driven by students, for students. Civic Engagement.

Educator innovator– moving from connected learning to connected teaching. California projects with the parks service and park rangers come through the parks to learn about Japanese internment. Challenged the idea that connected learning is about technology. It’s about connecting with people. Resources are endless.

Equity– access– making sure everyone has access. Connected Learning looks at it differently. Power is not in the device, but what we do with them. Just because we have the device, doesn’t mean they are beneficial. Divide between technology engagement and technology as a tool. Design with a shared purpose in mind that meets the needs of the students in the room. Equity can come across in many ways. Give students autonomy over how they learn. Technology not as a replacement for instruction, but as an enhancement.

Connected Learning is getting to the point where it’s becoming a part of mainstream educational discourse. Every time that starts to happen, it gets really exciting. But I’m scared that the culture of schooling will taint this concept of Connected Learning. We have to remember that we need to be challenging the system. How do we change it. WE need to push back on a powerful, already set method of learning. What does it mean to keep on pushing?

I had a really awesome time talking with Nicole and these are a modified version of my notes. I was going to compile a more cohesive version, but there were so many important details that I was afraid of neglecting any of them.

 

Resources

The group that I would like to work with as a teacher ally is women and girls in my classroom. Though there have been positive steps taken toward gender equality, you don’t have to be a genius to see that we live in a gendered society that benefits males more than females. This is true especially in the classroom. I remember having teachers in high school who would claim to be unbiased toward men or women, and yet their actions would speak far louder than words. My philosophy teacher would let the men in my IB 11 Epistemology class interrupt women with their opinions and would often give men praise over women even if the women in our class had a stronger argument.

It is this mentality that I strive to fix in my classroom as a teacher ally. Women are assets in both the classroom and in society and they should be treated as such in their education. One thing that I noticed while compiling this list was the variations of women that I could apply this goal to. Their are organizations the are geared toward women of color, women who have been sexually assaulted, women in poverty, single mothers, and many other categories in regard to scaffolding women’s education.

Unlocking Opportunity of African American Girls

I absolutely love this resource and anyone who is reading this should really check it out. One subgroup within the overarching group of women that I will support is women of color. This article, published by the NAACP focuses on providing educational equity to black women. This article takes the first several pages to illustrate the lives of these women in regard to their education, addressing the why these women face such barriers. Women of color face far more sexual harassment, racial profiling and stereotyping, and unnecessary punishment than their white counterparts. These women also fail to reap the benefits of programs such as sports and other extracurriculars due to cost, transportation, and other factors. After briefly covering these topics, the article provides tips and advice for teachers on how to change this toxic cycle of racial prejudice and supremacy.

Top 5 Takeaways:

• The NAACP has many resources for empowering women of color both in an outside the classroom
• The classroom needs to be the foundation for change in the lives of people who are vulnerable, specifically women of color
• Equity is the only way we can achieve access
• The only way women will reach out and try to make their lives better is telling them that they are capable.
• We need to acknowledge that there is both a racially and gender-motivated power dynamic that is oppressing women in order to effectively fix it.

Youth Voices

This website is a really awesome resource that allows young voices to be heard through writing. After entering the home page, you can choose a category in the right-hand margin and choose which topics you would like to read about. I chose “Women” and was pleasantly surprised to see what I found. It’s awesome that students of various academic levels and opinions have found a space to address real-world problems with one another. I think it’s so important to learn in the global theater because education is enhanced by learning from others. This website is a collection of student-produced blogs and articles.

Top 5 Takeaways:

• This would be an awesome project for my students to complete because it would empower them to address problems that they are passionate about. This would also be a powerful introduction to a gender studies unit, or even simply addressing women’s issues in society as they are reflected in literature (art imitates life).
• Students have opinions that need to be shared and appreciated
• Students are passionate and knowledgeable and should be treated as such.
• Education has been greatly geared toward the idea that adults have the power and should bestow it upon young people, but this resource flips the standard on its head so that students are learning fro their peers.
• There are plenty of women issues to be addressed, but even more importantly, there are plenty of strengths that women have had throughout history.

Dear Mrs. Feiran

Dear Feiran (School Mom),

You have had an incredible impact on my life. You were the first person to ever made me feel like an asset in the classroom. I never knew what it felt like to love learning until I met you. Being the oldest of four children, my parents always pressured me to take advanced classes, despite my pushing back. It wasn’t until I took your class my freshman year that I wanted to push myself. You have showed me what it means to be a learner and what it means to be a learner and what it means to stick up for myself and the things  that make my life worth living.

Thank you for making me feel that my writing, music, and theater careers were important. I grew up in a family that wanted me to go into a career in science or math, when that is obviously not my strong suit. Sometimes I would come home with a “B” on a math test and a huge smile on my face because I thought that I had failed only to be greeted with a stepfather who would smirk and tell me, “I will not have anyone in the family celebrating a ‘B’.” Then I would come to you, and you would give me a hug and a high five and ask me how everything else was going.

You made me feel like a person, not a grade. There were times when you played the role of a mother better than anyone else in my life was at the time. Thank you for staying with me after school to talk about my parents or how my friends decided to exile me in that last semester of my senior year. In times that I felt completely alone, you were always there. Thank you for taking me under your wing and telling me that I was talented. Those classes that I would help with and the papers I would grade lead me down the path that I am on now. You are the first person to take time out of her day to make me feel that I was special.

I especially want to thank you form myself as a woman. Your classes, commentary, and our little talks made me proud to be a woman in a world that seems completely against my kind. I am proud to be who I am because of you. And for that, I will never be able to thank you enough.

I am beyond excited to be your student teacher and to mentor young women in my classroom the way that you did for me.

Long story short, I just want to say thank you.

Love,

Haley

What Does it Mean to be a Teacher Ally?

Kelly Yazzie is a psychology, creative writing and english teacher at Niwot High School. In talking to her about her experience in education, I was actually shocked in what I found. She told me that she has chosen to be a teacher ally because she never had one in her time in school. Her parents were going through a divorce in her early years in high school and she had to work insane hours in order to make ends meet for her family in Oklahoma. In her efforts, Kelly was missing too much school. Teachers refused to work with her so that she could keep food on the table and administration gave her an ultimatum: either attend summer school, or drop out of school. At this point, I can feel the negative energy radiating in Kelly’s voice as she explains that this was not even a choice. She dropped out of school and managed to get her GED. Once her family had their feet almost back on the ground, her father managed to get Mrs.Yazzie a slot at the University of Oklahoma where she studied English and Psychology. From here, she graduated from law school and went on to have a successful career. However, Kelly realized that this was not her calling and she moved on to teach on a Navajo reservation. Here, she met her husband and learned just how impoverished these people are. She proceeded to move to Colorado where she now teaches and she continues to be an ally. She told me that it is er ultimate goal to be the antithesis of the teachers and administration at her high school. She makes herself personable and assignments flexible and accessible to every student. She wants her students to feel like people, like learners, in her classroom. Speaking as a former student, I can say that she has achieved this goal. Mrs.Yazzie always made me feel valuable and loved when I walked in her room and I would love to be just like her when I start my career.

The next person I interviewed was my friend Holly. She has been one of my closest friends since first grade and we started to grow apart after I moved away in middle school. She went through a time of rebellion and difficulties in school and at home until she met her graphic design teacher. She tells me that this woman played the role of a mother more than her own mother did. She took her on a trip to Europe to study graphic design over a summer and taught her that she had talent and value in this world. I can tell how deeply this woman impacted my dear friend purely by the sparkle in her eyes and how quickly she speaks when she talks about her. This woman is not only a professional graphic designer and teacher at a specialty school, she is also a role model for every one of her students. Holly explains the downward spiral she fell into until she met her teacher and explains that her influence is the reason why Holly has set goals for herself. This teacher gave Holly the value, inspiration, and encouragement that she needed to feel that she was worthy of success.

Finally, I interviewed my neighbor. Delma is a mother of two and a grandmother who has begun to devote her life to the wellbeing of her family. Her education experience was  not terribly influential in her life, but she recalls one business teacher that she has in her tenth-grade year of high school. This class was revolutionary for her because women were expected to take Home Economics or Family Studied, but she decided to take risk and go for a Business class. The man teaching this class could have treated her like an outsider, but instead decided to encourage her. When her male peers would treat her differently or exclude her, he would immediately intervene. It was this teacher who inspired her to go on and get a business degree and start her own bakery. She tells me that if it wasn’t for a teacher believing in her or vouching for her education, she may have been pigeon-holed into the role of a homemaker for the rest of her life. Though she does not believe that her education as a whole has impacted her life, I believe that this teacher ‘s influence is the only reason why education played any role in her life whatsoever.

 

Meet the Expert

Hannah Cahow is a second-year eighth grade English teacher in New York. This school focuses on a game-based learning approach that reminds me a lot of the Connected Learning philosophy. This technique requires student-centered immersive instruction that requires students to creatively think their way to an answer or final product. This school is interesting because it is incredibly diverse with various ethnicities, races, and socioeconomic classes. This school also has an eighth grade class that is composed of 40% IEP students and is a magnet for children with special needs. Hannah talked about how important it is to build a relationship with students when it comes to being an ally with students. While talking about this she emphasized the fact that relationships with students who are ever changing and different are never stable. Eighth graders in particular have an “aversion to authority” that they will flex with their teachers, even if a relationship seems solid. The thing I took away from this conversation was that teachers are a constant for students, but being their ally will not always be an easy task just because we believe that we make ourselves a stable and kind face in their lives. Being a teacher ally is an ever-changing challenge that we must be willing to meet head-on for our students.

Morning Pages: 12-1

I’ve learned a lot this semester about myself as a writer and as a future teacher. I think something that I really took away, though, was the idea of becoming an independent learner. Though Cindy always makes herself accessible and personable, this class really depends on our own motivation to finish things in a timely manner and in a quality that we can be proud of. This class took a big step away from the lecture-based education that I had become accustomed to within the last year and that’s really valuable.

As educators, it’s our jobs to not only educate our students, but also to teach them how to learn on their own. If we hold our students’ hands every step of the way through their earning process, is that truly learning? Of course we have to give them the opportunity to fail forward because if we simply tell them, “Make mistakes and learn from them!” and they fall flat on their face and it’s reflected in the grade book, that will only further precipitate a fear of education.

I think allowing students to wobble and to be independent learners with our guidance is the biggest sentiment that I have taken away from this class.

50 Great Teachers

I always love to take a moment to appreciate NPR. It reminds me how creative and strong humans can be in the face of adversity.

The first passage that I read was titled, “A ‘Wisdom Keeper.” This article was about a teacher named Miss Begay in Tucson, Arizona. She worked in a an elementary school composed of predominantly Native American, Hispanic and Somalian students. The community seems very geared away from education, though Miss Begay had an opposite view. She shares that Navajo teachers are deemed as “wisdom keepers” who are revered at the leaders who had the responsibility of the intellectual upbringing of a new generation. Anyone who reads this article can see this mentality play into Begay’s teaching. One of her students commented, “‘She teaches me when I don’t want to learn.'” This really stuck with me because I think that that is every teacher’s goal. No matter where we teach or who our audience is, there will be students who are apprehensive to learning. I love how Miss Begay takes this attitude and uses it to drive her to work harder and connect with every student in her classroom, even those who have been treated as a lost cause. Her compassion, enthusiasm and warmth clearly radiate through the author’s writing and I would love to reflect this same feeling with my students.

The next article that I looked at was about a New York teacher named Mister Whaley. Whaley is a second grade teacher whose classroom is largely composed of ESL students and children of immigrant families. Whaley is one of the “Great Teachers” because he does everything in his power to empower his ESL students. He asks them to participate in class activities to the same extent that native English speakers do. He also reassures them that being an immigrant or having family who are immigrants is not a bad thing. We live in a nation that is progressively moving toward the idea that diversity and having immigrant status should have negative repercussions. In order to combat this, Whaley takes time in his classroom to celebrate the term “immigrant” and explain how important these people are to our society. Whaley is a great teacher who has made himself an ally to bilingual students.

Lena Solow is a sex ed teacher in the Bronx. the article starts off acknowledging the cringe factor that we all feel with the subject of sex ed. However, this tone changes as the author delve into the tone Solow has on the subject. This teacher uses her content area to empower women, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ community without rustling too many feathers. Though her classroom celebrates sex and sexuality, she does this in such a way that preaches inclusion and lack of judgement, rather than saying that a child’s parent’s opinion is wrong. She does not want her classroom to become a battleground for the “right” and “wrong,” but rather a place where students can shed their armor and feel safe in their sexual identity. I think this is a content area that we need to bring more focus to as a nation because out next generation needs to understand the idea of tolerance, acceptance, and respect for both sexual identity and sexuality as a whole. I love the steps that this teacher is taking to achieve this.