Hard Reset: A whole class intervention

I want to talk a little bit about a whole class intervention that I have used when things in class are going off the rails. But first: 

Who's responsibility is classroom engagement and cooperation*? 

Now, I am not a fan of anyone telling teachers that classroom management challenges are their fault- by any means- and I also know that my own actions and beliefs can lead to power struggles and problems. They are also in my control. 

This article by Angela Watson (Truth for Teachers) is a very good read about this topic: Is your "invisible throne" creating power struggles and unnecessary work?  I also went back and re-read this article (also by Angela Watson): How to respond to rude, disrespectful student attitudes.  

Ideas about controlling students (coercing them, manipulating them) is one way that White Supremacy manifests in classroom management, and in my work to dismantle systems of oppression and find places where White Supremacy is guiding my actions, I choose to reframe how I think about kids and behavior. 

*I prefer the term classroom engagement and cooperation over classroom management. It makes more sense to me. I don't want to manage students. I want to cooperate with them and engage with them.

Individual interventions

I get a lot of questions in workshops about individual kids and their behavior, and my response is always the same: approach with curiosity. Why is that kid doing that thing (usually blurting)? Do they know they are doing it? Is there a need not being met? Is there a relationship to develop? Depending on the answers, the interventions are going to be different. Kids are kids- and one strategy is not going to support every student. Also- consider: if it is just one or two kids that you are struggling with- how awesome is that?!? Celebrate that! Then approach those kids with curiosity.  In my Plan B post, I have a long list of possible individual and whole class interventions- take a look. 

Whole Class Intervention

This intervention is one I learned from Jon Cowart (I think) and mad props to him for his amazing work on classroom management. This is my version of a hard reset. 

However, please know- this is one intervention in a whole menu of interventions. And like many items on a menu, they are best when served with other items. I suggest adding a heaping serving of Plan A Minus or Plan B, if you're asking! 

This whole class intervention came about because I could not successfully teach a lesson. Students were interrupting me and disengaged (how is that even possible? They managed it!) and talkative and off task. This was a situation where the majority of students were not cooperating nor were they engaged- not just one or two- so I needed to approach the class as a whole.  Mind you: I was a "long term" sub with a very firm end date. I was not their "real" teacher and that was made perfectly clear, and not just by the students. So there were some factors that were out of my control. 

I had to focus on what I could control: my own practice. 

I started with curiosity.

Self-Reflection

So my reflective, curious questions to myself were:

• Had I done a good job explaining the expectations? Did I go over the expectations ALL the time? 
• Did I give students the chance to practice meeting expectations? 
• Did I celebrate when expectations were met?
• Were my expectations culturally responsive and appropriate? 
• Was I consistent or inconsistent? 
• Was I using the target language so that students were understanding the input? 
• Was I talking to the students or with the students? 
• Was I teaching content that was at all interesting to the students, or including them and their interests?  
• Were there relationships that I could develop? 
• Were there opportunities to develop relationships (with students and caregivers) that I could take advantage of? Examples would be sending a positive email home, or talking to the student's coach to find out more about them and their interests. 
• What did the students -as a group- need that they weren't getting? 
• Could I provide that with my time and energy and means? 

It became clear to me, upon reflection, that I had not taken enough time to set and practice expectations, and in fact, had not considered their input at all. Since I was a substitute  and had limited time with them, I made the decision at the beginning to use the classroom teacher's expectations.  With some classes that seemed to work fine. But with the 8th graders, it was not working.  Lots of things weren't working.

I also realized that in addition to expectations, students needed more structure- they were used to one thing, and they needed scaffolding to be able to do something different. Thus: the More Structured Input plan, aka Plan A minus.  I implemented both interventions more or less simultaneously, and although I didn't have a lot of time with students, it made the last few days with them more successful and more fun for everyone. 

Hard Reset

When students walked in, I had some kind of starter on the board, but instead of reviewing it, I sat on a stool in front of them and I said something like "I don't feel like class has been going well, and I think we need to come up with some norms and agreements so that I can do my job of teaching and you can do your job of learning. I have been very frustrated because I don't feel like I am doing a lot of teaching, and I get the sense that you all are frustrated too. So we are going to start over." I did this in our shared language (English). 

I made a classic T-chart on the board with the titles Student and Teacher. I asked them what their job was. Some shouted out, but most were happy to raise their hand and offer their ideas. For each student job they came up with, I said "so what does that mean for me?" and added my job. 

There was some negotiation, and some explaining on my part. Like when I had to say "the thing that I am most frustrated about is when you talk over me. I can't do my job when that happens. So how can we address that?" 

I learned that one student thought I was really mean and unreasonable- I had no idea- because of a comment I'd made that they misunderstood. I also learned that, for the most part, they wanted to be there and learn Spanish, and were incredibly frustrated with their peers that were being mean. 

This is important: Jon Cowart reminds us that expectations need to be OBSERVABLE. "Respect" is not an observable behavior.   "One person speaks at a time" is observable. 

I had to work with them (not entirely successfully as you will see) to keep behaviors observable. 

This is what we came up with in one class:

Image ID: T-chart with student jobs (listen the first time, focus, move quickly, Don't be attention seeking, use Spanish*, Hands to self, ask a friend) and teacher job (Give clear instructions, 2nd chances, give support, brain breaks, use Spanish*, be nice/flexible, use a kind tone)

This took most of the class time. We even did a brain break game in the middle.  Or maybe more than one!

I let the students know that we would be signing a document with these new norms in the next couple of days. (I wanted to live with them and see if there was anything missing or problematic before committing to them, honestly!)

Then what?

The following day as a starter (bell-ringer),  students were shown the list and asked to pick 2 agreements to focus on. They had to use a sentence frame to write about why it was important. They did this in English, our shared language. 

Image ID: A slide with directions for the starter, sentence frames "I will (choose one from the list). This is important because..." and a picture of class agreements. 

Before starting any language instruction, I went through the Norms in English and let them know that at the end of class, they would be reflecting on what they chose. 

At the end of class, I had them use the same scrap of paper that they wrote on to reflect-I asked them to put one to five stars on each sentence, one star being "nope, I didn't really succeed at this" and five being "I succeeded at focusing on this agreement". I collected these reflections but I did not ask them for names. I was curious to see if their self-reflections matched my perception of how class went- and it turns out, it did...mostly.

The following day, we signed the agreements, one at a time, and put them on the board, and again, I started class by reading them. 

Moderate Success!

And you know what? Between this hard reset and giving them more structure in class, I began to see improvement in both engagement and cooperation. It wasn't what I had hoped for- it wasn't the 8th grade class of March 2020, those dreamy kids who did everything I asked and then wanted more- it was the actual kids in front of me, being somewhat successful. More successful, at least.

I could see that there was an upward trajectory- progress was being made, and with patience and work, we could have a lot of fun and use a lot of language.

 Unfortunately, all that happened the last week I was subbing, so I didn't get a chance to let it play out in the long run. That's ok. I think small successes add up to big ones, and being able to have some discussions and do some things in class, in the target language, is actually a pretty big success!

I hope that this look at a Hard Reset, paired with some other structured input plans, help you! 

Write & Discuss: Sometimes I win, sometimes I belly flop

I see a lot of discussion about a technique known as Write and Discuss, and I have to be honest here. I love the idea of it, but it pretty much always feels weird, boring, and sometimes downright painful when I do it in my classes.

So I have to ask myself: is that my perception?  I also know that going as slowly as I need to for comprehension and limiting my vocabulary for novices is also weird, boring, and sometimes downright painful. For me.  But is it for my kids? Should I do it anyway? Am I conflating entertainment with practices that support acquisition?  Can I do a better job at using it as a tool? (Well, duh, of course I can!)    

Here are a few thoughts about all of this.

1) Just because it is boring for me doesn't mean that it's not incredibly valuable and perhaps not boring for my learners.  (Going slowly and sheltering vocab is a great example. If you don't believe me, try taking a class in a language you don't know.  Learn to LOVE going slow.)   I'm not the one who needs to be engaged, right?  It's all about the learners (within reason, of course).  

2) If I think it is boring, and my students' body language seems to agree, maybe I can change it up.  Do it better.  

3) I know from my own experiences as a teacher and learner that it is an immensely powerful tool and can support acquisition in all kinds of ways.  When I first started playing around with it a couple of years ago, the difference in student writing was almost immediate- students were using a LOT more 1st person forms of verbs and using them much more accurately.  I was immensely pleased- especially because it was the only real change I made during that time of the year.   

OK, so, here goes my reflection on trying use it, do it better, and examining what did and didn't work.

In Spanish 1B, 8th grade, we are doing a ClipChat (aka MovieTalk) that is included in SOMOS 1, Unit 10.  It is a very, very silly video and nothing terribly exciting happens.  It is also in Spanish and uses a lot of unfamiliar and hard to understand language, so even though I keep the volume on, I rephrase pretty much every utterance, plus add descriptions and narration as we are watching it.  I *will* give the kids an embedded reading of this when we are done.  

After watching a few moments of it the day before, I decided to watch it again from the beginning on Wednesday's class, but pause to do a Write and Discuss to summarize what we had already seen.  

Here is where I got stuck: the physical layout of my classroom is such that I had the movie projected on my smartboard, and then did the write and discuss on a board off to the side.   I didn't think that I could manage switching between screens of the movie and a google doc, nor would I be able to pause the movie so we could describe (and write and discuss) what was on the screen.  

I did the (fairly) typical thing where I asked leading questions and students helped guide me to a sentence, then I added in more academic language (because that is one use of Write and Discuss, in my opinion).  This is what one class came up with:  

El cocinero está en el restaurante. Henry está en el restaurante porque tiene hambre. George está feliz y ríe cuando ve a Henry.  Henry quiere comer p. f. [patatas fritas] pero George no quiere que Henry coma p. f. porque George no tiene patatas.  Henry va a encontrar patatas.  Va a la tienda, pero Gabriela ya se acaba de patatas.  Ella recomienda que Henry vaya al mercado.  

The cook is in the restaurant. Henry is in the restaurant because he is hungry. George is happy and laughs when he sees Henry.  Henry wants to eat french fries, but George does not want that Henry eats french fries because George does not have potatoes.  Henry goes to find potatoes.  He goes to a shop, but Gabriela just ran out of potatoes. She recommends that he goes to the market.  

OK, so, that was pretty great. We re-watched a bit of the video, then added a sentence and discussed it, and the grammar focused kid asked a grammar question which I answered in 10 seconds or less, and all told, I feel like it was good input.

But oh, their body language, even with brain breaks, was devastating to me. They were lolling and wiggly and all the things that normally they are not.  So...success?   

I then did exactly the same thing with the next class- who are, as a group, a little quicker at everything, so we wrote almost twice as much in the same amount of time, and again...lolling and wiggles.  

Next up was my Spanish 2 honors class.  We have been working in SOMOS 1, unit 15, La Guerra Sucia, and I asked the open ended question: "What do you know about the Madres de la plaza de Mayo?" (In Spanish.) 

This time, I wrote directly on the smartboard (with whiteboard markers- they wipe off like magic!), and didn't have anything else projected.  

We co-created this text and talked about it for about 15 minutes, up until I had some students get up and act out something that I was describing (a kidnapping that we were going to read about in a few minutes) so they could visualize it before reading about it.  

Here is that text:  

Las madres es un grupo de mujeres quien no pueden encontrar a sus hijos.  El gobierno les dice que no puede ayudarles, pero las madres piensen que no es la verdad. El dictador de Argentina en 1976 no quería el socialismo. Los desapariciones ocurrieron durante esa época.  Los hijos- los desaparecidos-participaron en actividades socialistas.  Hoy en día, Las Madres protestan (marchan para conmemorar) en Buenos Aires. Llevan pañuelos que representan la inocencia de sus hijos.

The Mothers is a group of women that can not find their kids.  The government tells them that it can't help them, but the mothers think that is not the truth.  The dictator of Argentina in 1976 didn't want socialism.  The disappearances occurred during this time period.  The kids- the disappeared- participated in socialist activities.  Nowadays, the mothers protest (march to commemorate) en Buenos Aires, Argentina.  They wear handkerchiefs that represent the innocence of their children.

For the other classes, I felt like I was doing the heavy lifting. For this class, they we just telling me what to write, and I was adding some tweaks- like instead of "white scarf" I used "handkerchief".  We also had a rousing debate whether the government tells them or told  them, and the decided that since it was still happening, it should be present tense.  (There is some higher order thinking.)  

They were 100% engaged- all of them- and they were arguing about whether or not they should say that all the disappeared students were involved in socialist activities, but decided to let it lie.  (They asked later if we could change that as they learned new info, by the way.)  

So, what were the differences?  1) I was in front of them, not to the side. 2) They were super interested in this topic.  3) They had a lot more language and felt confident about using it.  

Hmmm....what can I learn from that? 

Finally, in my last class, 7th grade Honors Spanish 1, I decided to do a spontaneous Write and Discuss to summarize their answers to the question "Is it a good idea to talk about your personal problems on the internet?"  (This is a starter question from SOMOS 1, Unit 5.)

Based on what had worked in the last class, I decided to write on the smartboard at the center of the room.  I also kept it super short- bullet points rather than a connected paragraph.  

Here were our positives and negatives:  


+ Puedes ser anónimo.  Si usas Snapchat, los mensajes desaparecen (pero Snap. los conservan.)  Puedes conectar con muchas personas y recibir ayuda.

+ You can be anonymous.  If you use Snapchat, the messages disappear, but Snap keeps them.  You can connect with a lot of people and get help.

-Es posible que otra persona descubra tus palabras.  Son tus problemas personales, no son los problemas de todo el mundo. Personas antipáticas pueden usar tus palabras en contra de tí.

-It's possible that the other person discovers your words.  They are your personal problems, not the problems of the whole world.  Mean people can use your words against you.  

It went pretty well.  I think that keeping it short and bulletpointed actually worked very well for this class.  They struggled some with expressing what they wanted to say but we practiced some circumlocution skills and I helped them come up with the right words.

So, overall, I think that I want to do more Write and Discuss, and that I need to keep them focused on the central point in the room, and that if I can type them, it is probably better.  

Some other points made by my fantastic Professional Learning Community members (Bess Hayles and Andrea Schweitzer) when we were talking about Write and Discuss:

• It is a great time to use written academic language that doesn't necessarily fall out of our teacher mouths during discussions.
• It is especially great to use if the students are not going to see a text of the event (video clip picture talk, discussion, etc.) later so that they get some reading in.
• Andrea Schweitzer pointed out that for her, when her instructor does it in Chinese at the end of class, she feels like her brain craves the part where all the talk comes together in a reading (this is totally my interpretation of her comment).  
• Keeping it short- 5 minutes- seems to be ideal.
• Sometimes kids also copy it, but it seems for most of us, we don't have the kids copy it. (Although I totally admit to using this as a bail out move a couple of times this fall with my Plan B class: "You guys can't handle anything else, so now we are copying off the board.")  

So there it is! Have a great week! Guess what I will be working on?  That's right! Write and Discuss!  

Implementing Plan B: when the classroom management strategies just aren't enough

Plan B: I wanted to share a little bit today about how I have two classes that are really challenging this year- for different reasons- and how they have become my Plan B classes.  

First, here is what I mean by Plan B.

https://comprehensibleclassroom.com/2012/10/30/plan-b/

A little background:  

One class is the class that I have not yet been able to finish a story with. There are constant interruptions. I have a personal belief against sending kids out of class, and in general none of the interruptions are truly horrible or worth sending a kid out for- they are just unbelievably frustrating. Like dozens, or hundreds of low-level constant interruptions and annoyances that bring everything to a screaming halt. 

I have tried a bunch of different strategies and interventions over the last 5 weeks, but finally at the beginning of this week, I decided to go to Plan B.

So, why am I doing it? Well, I realized I was being drained. I was trying everything in my toolbox of classroom management strategies.  

Here are those tools and interventions I used:

• I taught and practiced procedures. Over, and over, and over again. I refused to move forward until everyone was doing what I expected them to do. With a smile! (I smiled- them, not so much.) (In L1)
• I responded quickly, and positively, to every single instance of a student not doing what I wanted. I have posted rules, and each time a student spoke out of turn or had a side conversation, I walked over to the rules and waited, patiently, smiling, until I had the full attention of everyone.  (Rules are in L1.) (This is a strategy I learned from here.)

• I narrated the positives constantly. In L1.

• I reviewed the expectations before each new activity. I asked students to volunteer to be positive examples and model the desired behavior, and narrated it. In L1.

• I used proximity, seating charts, and secret signals to indicate to a kid that they were going off the rails.

• I found something positive (behavior wise) to write home about and emailed or called the caregivers of the most challenging kids, to show that they *could* be successful in my class. Sometimes I wrote about how Little Johnny had a rough day on Thursday but really turned it around at the beginning of class on Friday. It was *something* positive, right?

• I met with the kids who just didn't get it, individually, and tried to connect, build relationships, find what they are interested in, etc. I even paid attention to student athletics- which for me, is a big deal.

• I sought help from other teachers in our student support meetings, documented behaviors so I could try to see patterns within myself, time of day, activities, and/or students.

• I implemented different interventions such as rocky stools, weight belts, fidgets, and bouncy sensory chair pads. (One kid sliced one of my homemade weight belts with scissors. That was not awesome.)

• I changed the kinds of brain breaks I did in those classes (from energizing to focusing and silent).

Whew! That's a lot of interventions!  

But NOTHING WORKED. And I was miserable. And I hated that it felt like a power struggle. I know that no one wins a power struggle.

Worse? I was spending so much time redirecting, responding, and eventually reacting, that there just wasn't a lot of input happening. And for the kids who want to be there? For the kids who are controlling themselves? Who crave the input and the fun? They were getting nothing except frustration.

Now, an earlier version of me might have justified throwing out the ringleaders. And yes, on a day with one of them absent, well, we got a TON accomplished.  

But I have to ask myself: will kicking them out solve the problem? Sort of, but only in the short term. And also, won't that eat up a ton of time in meetings with parents and admins, follow up meetings, documenting, writing plans, etc.? And you know that time will come right out of my planning and/or after school hours.  And will it change the behaviors?

Will it just turn our relationship into kid vs. adult? Will it cement their identity of "bad kid" and trouble maker? Can I break that cycle? Don't I have a responsibility to teach all kids, even the ones who make it the most difficult?  

But don't I have a responsibility to the other kids too, those who are losing out due to the poor choices of the few?  

This, my friends, is the eternal teacher question. And also why Plan B makes so much sense to me.  

In short, Plan B means that students get input that they understand, but the interaction as a community is missing. The input might be from a story, a pre-written text, a video, or whatever else was in my plan for the day. The activity to deliver input is altered so that students do it all independently. It is very heavy on reading. 

What it looked like: 

This week, the plan was to Clipchat (Movietalk) Sr. Wooly's video for Qué asco, read a more complex version of the video written up to be like a story, and invent our own gross combinations (like the song) to see who had the grossest and which one would smell the worst.  

I knew that at this point that students would not be able to manage a ClipChat/MovieTalk. Their interruptions would be too much, so I had to let that go. Oh well.
Instead, I decided to have them read and interact a bit with the reading (available with a Pro subscription) and then we would watch the video, then I would have them write (instead of draw and eventually use their illustrations for card talk) the gross combinations. Rather than trying to have a discussion about their gross combinations, I would have them respond ONLY with hand signals. If they could handle it. 
It has been more work. I had to create slides (ugh! I HATE creating slides! I hate working from slideshows in general!) with very clear directions.  

It has been work that I am, frankly, not used to doing. I have to very carefully plan out each activity and write it out- then make sure there is a text to read, a way to support their comprehension, and then something to do for fast finishers. 

Now, I do all these things normally, but I do them in the moment, based on how I am feeling and how the class is going. (This is one advantage of being experienced. I give directions on the fly and change how we use a reading or activity based on what is happening that day. That does NOT fly for Plan B.)
It is boring- while they read, I circulate. I monitor. It is NOT interaction. I am even more strict than usual (absolutely no talking. None!).  
I hate it. It is not my personality and it doesn't feel right to me. It is *not* an interactive classroom. It is not wacky, memorable, and it is really not fun. For any of us.  
But...it is working. Kids are getting input. I am not super frustrated at the end of the day. (Bored, but that is better than angry.) 

Kids who didn't get input because of all the distractions are getting input. Kids who were distracting are...getting input. Is it as rich and compelling as it would be if we were acting out the movietalk and exploring what they think are gross combinations? Not at all. But..it is input, and it feels a lot more equitable in that I am able to do my job and not spend most of my time and energy on just a few kids.  
And at the end of class yesterday, I tried a turn-n-talk. (This has not yet worked consistently.) They managed it. It felt nice. We reflected on the feeling of class in L1. It was a better day. One kid in particular got a positive email home.  

The next day, I tried another turn and talk and lead a short discussion. Each day, I want to give the class back to interaction, just a bit more, so that we can get back to the fun. But for now, Plan B is going to let me stay sane and keep doing my job of providing comprehensible input, so I am very thankful.

Two toxic moments in staff meetings and what we can learn about being truly inclusive

This is a post that I want to write because these incidents happened.  There are a lot of other incidents that don't necessarily rise to the top in the pile of indignities, assumptions,  and examples of ignorance that are part of the life of being a bi-racial Latinx woman who is white passing and who is not afraid to speak up.  Name spelling and pronunciation, anyone?  (And yes, I acknowledge the great privilege I carry with my light colored skin and hair color.)

These things happen, and I think we can learn from them. So, stick with me.  This is not about comprehensible input.  It is about being better teachers.  And hopefully better humans.  

Anyway, let me give some background.

If you have read my blog for a while, you maybe know that one great passion of mine is inclusion, with the related passions of diversity, social justice, anti-bias, and dismantling the system of oppression and racism and bias that we live with every day.   

One key idea for me in being inclusive is that each member of my classroom (and hopefully community) feels safe and seen for who they are and what they need. They feel safe to say no if they are uncomfortable, or to ask a question if they don't get it.  They feel safe talking, or not talking.  

One of the greatest compliments that I have ever been given was in feedback about a presentation I did this summer.  I am putting it out here because it makes me feel great (because I read this blog too!) and because this idea of safety goes hand in hand with consent.  I am grateful that what I try to do was seen.  

[Elicia] was so open and engaging that she made each of us in the over-crowded room feel welcome. She modeled many important social-emotional practices: tiny physical "brain breaks" to reset our tired minds, differentiating by offering different options and encouraging us to make the activities we liked our own, responding to all suggestions and comments with "yes and", and above all, modeling asking consent for every little thing - "do you mind if I use your picture?" "may I use you as an example?" 

So this work is not just part of my teaching practice, it is who I am and what I bring to the classroom.  I believe in it and it's important to me.     

Fast forward to some incidents in staff meetings.  I want to be clear that I don't have issue with the activities I am describing.  I have concerns with the responses made by my peers, and I want to bring to light some of the embedded assumptions that are made when choosing these activities.   And I want to highlight what a good response to these kinds of incidents looks like. 

After these incidents, I sat down with my administrator and shared my concerns and we made a good plan to address them.  I am really thankful that I have a administrator who makes time and takes time to hear me, and takes these concerns very seriously.  

#1: In a getting-to-know you activity, there is a soccer ball being with questions written on it being tossed around. When you catch it, you answer the question that your right thumb lands on.  This game was being modeled as one that could be played in class or in our advisory groups, with kids.  Some questions were about favorite things, like breakfast cereals, and others were things like "what makes you sad?". 

Let's digest that for a minute.  First, what are the assumptions there?  

• Everyone in the community knows about breakfast cereals.  
• Everyone gets to eat breakfast.
• Everyone is feeling comfortable with getting a ball tossed at them.
• Everyone has the physical ability to catch the soccer ball. 
• Everyone feels comfortable talking about what makes them sad.  (Because you know what makes me sad?  Surviving this.  Is that really what people want to hear?  Trust me, the answer is usually no.) 

Being me, I asked the person running the game what happens if a student doesn't want to answer that question. (Because if I don't speak up, who will?)  Before an answer could be given, someone snickered and made a very belittling comment about what a stupid question that was, that they (the students) could answer the questions.  

Wait- WHAT?  Do we not want all students to feel safe?  Do we not acknowledge that students come from different backgrounds?  

The game leader (our very thoughtful admin) quickly responded "oh sure, great question- have them answer one near their thumb" and moved on.   

So, on one hand, I feel like the admin heard the question, acknowledged its value, and answered it.  I felt seen and heard.  But on the other hand, not only was my question belittled, there was no awareness from at least one colleague that it might be relevant. 

#2:  In a later activity, several pictures of a prominent sports figure were projected, displaying different emotions.  The activity was an emotional check-in.  The pictures were of this sports figure with different facial expressions, and we were supposed to put our initials next to the image that best expressed our emotional state.  

Again, let's dig in to some assumptions about the activity: 

• Everyone can read facial expressions and assign meaning to them.
• All participants know who the sports figure is.
• Everyone is comfortable sharing their emotional state.

I was not super happy for a number of reasons when this activity occurred.  But more frustrating to me was that I had no idea who the sports figure was and I didn't really know what the expressions were.  I asked who the person was (because asking about the expressions felt like it would open me up to ridicule, so I chose instead what I thought was a safer route).  The admin quickly responded, telling me the name and sport. No biggie.  

But my colleagues gaped.  "You don't know who X is?" "Do you know who Y is either?"  "How can you not know who X is?" "Are you serious?"  

I was shocked.  Like, really, really shocked.  Hurt, disappointed, sad, angry, and a dozen other negative emotions.

I want to reiterate what I said at the beginning of this post.  I did speak to my administrator. He heard me. We made a plan. I felt heard and seen and respected.  It's ok and I'm ok.  But it is a solid example of embedded assumptions and of not treating each other with respect and kindness.  And of side conversations getting out of control.   

Imagine if I was a kid in a class where that happened.  Maybe I'm 12 and growing in all kinds of new places.  Maybe I am new to the school.  Maybe my family doesn't allow screen use at all.  Maybe I just lost my parent. Maybe I ...there are a million maybes.  But I am sure that in that moment, I have completely lost the trust of that kid.  Note that the person running the activities, the "teacher" (admin, in this case), handled each moment with consideration and kindness.  It was the side talk, the outside conversations that were harmful.  

And please, I am not saying that every kid needs to be coddled and treated like a precious snowflake.  I believe deeply in the gift of failure, the power of hearing no, and the growth that those bring.   

But friends, they see a lot more of the real world than we think.  And they are still kids.  

I can not control what happens to them outside of my classroom.  I can commit to making my classroom as safe as possible.  Especially in 2019.  

What can I take away from these situations as a teacher? (Hopefully they will apply to you too.) 

For me,  it is to critically examine the actual things I do in the classroom and constantly ask myself what assumptions I am making.  Yes, it is exhausting.  I am going to do it anyway.

It is also to take a moment before reacting- to questions, to comments, to actions.  But especially to questions.  If I want to give an eye roll or a smirk, I need to check that right at the door. Because it is legitimate to someone.  

I need to keep focusing on creating a community where those kind of side comments can't happen (through procedures) and don't happen (through community building) and when (not if; I am only human) they do, I own it and address it.

I need to remember to take a cue from my administrator.  He never got defensive.  He owned what happened, apologized sincerely, and together we found a way to repair it.  

Most important, I need to keep asking questions and question other peoples' assumptions.   

I need to remember that it takes courage to ask questions and call attention to unpopular ideas and call people out on their assumptions.  And sometimes I am going to feel bad or unwelcome.  (These weren't even about race. Think about that.)   I need to remember that is who I am- courageous- and find ways to connect with communities that support me and that build me up and help me when I'm down.   

Standards Based Grading and My Classroom Practice

Grades. Assessment.  The pile of papers staring at me, just waiting for me to put little marks on them, then enter some more marks in the computer, so that kids and parents can ignore, celebrate, or argue  about (with each other or with me, depending on family culture).

Doesn't it just feel overwhelming sometimes?  And I feel like I have a pretty good handle on it!!! (Click here for information about what goes in my gradebook, here for how I grade reading and listening quizzes, and here for how I grade writing.)

I recently attended a 2 day seminar on Standards Based Grading with Rick Wormeli. (It was awesome.)  I am not at all new to his work and ideas, and I have spent time with proficiency based grading (a la Marzano- two full seminars).  I am also enrolled in an edX course (offered by the MIT teaching and learning lab) about Competency Based Grading.  Since the term ends in a few weeks, I am looking at end of term grades, my grading practice, my assessments, and trying to make sense of my new learning.   So, this is more of a personal blog post, with less practicality and more reflection.

 In no particular order, here is my attempt to process what I came away with:

Schools conspire against learning. Yes, well, this is so patently obvious it almost doesn't need commentary.  If I could just teach, and be free of the arbitrary nature of so much of my job, I would be a better teacher and I think the kids would acquire more.

Never sacrifice sound pedagogy because someone above you isn't there yet.
Yes.  Yes. A MILLION TIMES yes.

Sorting or cultivating? Is one better than the other?
Isn't that language super judgmental?

Are we here to sort or cultivate students?  I think I am here to cultivate students. So what am I doing that is sorting? Is sorting a negative word? Thanks to my colleague today who pointed out that it doesn't have to be negative.  When I differentiate, isn't it sorting?

Is it sorting to put a judgement on a product (an assessment, a project)?  Wormeli argues yes.  He argues that judgement does not promote learning.  But that assumes that students have control over their own learning, which is true for learning that involves the explicit system (math, science, other subjects) but not true for the implicit system of language acquisition.

I believe that giving feedback isn't going to affect their acquisition, especially not at the levels I teach (mostly 1 and 2).  Giving feedback on what they can control- that is, behavior that supports language acquisition...well, now we are getting into compliance.  And that is messy.

On another note: if I am teaching to cultivate, what about tracking students?  (My school has two tracks of math and Spanish.)  This brings up a lot of personal stuff for me because my experience with school was terrible and consisted of virtually no differentiation until there were honors classes that I could go into.  (I dropped out of public school and went to college at age 16.)  Now that I teach honors classes, I strongly believe that I am serving the kids better by splitting them up by proficiency, and meeting them where they are at.  But this is a very unpopular view, and I can see why.  I am going to have to put that one aside for now.

Compliance or competency?  MESSY!  

Compliance vs. Competency: It is MESSY.
Some of my peers and trainers argue that we should never grade for compliance (engagement), because that has nothing to do with their competency. And what about neuro-diverse students?   Others say that we should not grade their competency because they have no control over it, but we should grade what they can control (behaviors that support language learning), which is basically compliance.

Assessment is where we live our values. This resource, from the indominable Tina Hargaden, comes at just the right time.  But it brings up some difficult questions for me.  Am I grading too hard? Am I accurately assessing their proficiency levels?  Am I falsely inflating or deflating grades?  How do I know what proficiency levels look like?

Because if I am being honest, according to Tina's rubrics, I grade WAAAY low.  But I am consistent within my department, and within myself.  This is important to acknowledge, and a thought that I come back to again and again.  Scott Benedict's trainings on assessing freewrites helped me solidify this.  For more information, check out his work at Teachforjune.com.


I am already using standards based grades, and I think that my grades finally (mostly) represent what students can do and understand.  Whew. What a relief.  I have worked SO hard on this. And this is the best year so far, in that my students' reported grades really do seem to reflect their proficiency, not their organization or compliance. Sure, I can improve, but I feel like I am on the right track.  Even if I am trying to squeeze into my school's 100 point averaging system.

If I believe that students have no control over the rate at which they acquire language, I should not be grading them. Period. Full stop.  
Ouch.  And yes.  But reporting what they can do is valuable, both for them and for me, and required in the school system.  And I do like to see what they can do, and so do they.

Corollary: If students can't control what they acquire, why am I spending so much time and effort on this assessment stuff?  I mean, weighing the pig more often does not make it fatter.  
Oh wait. Because this is actually part of my job. Hmm.  Refer to my first point.  However, it does give me some peace thinking that my goal to load up the input, create a community where students feel valued, recognized, and successful, and where I love to go every day (because I have the time for self-care and self-reflection), is actually where my time should be spent.  And the majority of my assessments *should* be input-focused.  (Thanks to Lance Piantaginni for helping me see the value in input-based assessments.  After all: more input is always a good thing.)

I am so grateful to not be tied to a fixed schedule of summative assessments that are worth a certain percent and are unrecoverable.  However, I *am* still tied to getting enough grades in the grade book.  And "citizenship" as a grading category. (Can you hear the scorn dripping from my voice? This is one school requirement that really chafes at me.)

The assumption that students can control their language acquisition is incorrect, and the assumption that giving them descriptive feedback will help is just plain wrong.  Sorry, Rick.  
It might not be wrong for subjects like math etc. that rely on explicit learning, but the nature of second language acquisition is different.  Thanks, Bill VanPatten, for helping me get real clear about this.  So I am not going to spend a ton of time giving them feedback.  The payoff isn't that great for the time spent, especially when I could spend my time taking care of myself so I can better connect with kids, or finding interesting, compelling things to talk about with them, or trying to build my skills to speak so that they understand me.  Because those actions actually will help them acquire more.

Which leads me to some classroom practices that I am re-examining: 

Student Learning Objectives: 

Oh man, we love our objectives, don't we?  Many teachers have to have different ones daily, and track each student through each one and blah blah blah.  I am (once again) very grateful to work at a school where they are not required.  I developed them anyway, and every time I go back to teach a unit again, I look at them to decide if they still have meaning.  I think it is important that the kids know what the end goal is, even if it is very broad.  In fact, I hand them out to the kids to glue in their interactive-ish notebooks, and even post them as part of our starters.

In the first few weeks of the year, I ask students to self-reflect on their learning daily, usually based on the starter we did, and discuss what objective it was checking and what they can do to acquire.


But I stopped doing this around around October. I stopped because I would rather speak Spanish and ask how they are doing and just converse, not meta-process something over which they have no control.  Plus, twice a week, my starter is FVR/SSR, with no paperwork for the kids.

Another reason I stopped going over objectives was because the answer to "how will you move up the proficiency ladder" is ALWAYS more input.  I can remind kids of where to find that input (in class, on my class web page, during office hours, etc.) and that they can access it without anyone else, but the answer never changes.  And I felt like a broken record.  (There might be value in that though.)  It can be useful to have the discussion about the value of "practice", quizlet, and "write sentences". (That is, if it is input, it's great.  "Practicing sentences" or flashcards on quizlet , probably not.)


What I changed: After returning from the Wormeli workshop, I intentionally decided to refer to the objectives again in each class, and give the opportunity for self-reflection of progress.  My high-anxiety, high achievers really liked it.  Most of the others seemed to be confused and/or tuned out. And it took SO MUCH TIME!!

My verdict?  I think that I will continue creating and sharing objectives, and when the mood strikes, ask the kids to look at their progress and the objectives (through the starter), but it is not going to be a daily thing.  Maybe weekly?

Target structures, rubrics, and feedback:
I often ask students to write quick freewrites (10 minutes) at the end of the unit and incorporate the target structures from that unit. For first year students in 7th grade and Spanish 1B (8th grade) I decided that students being able to use the structures as practiced (3rd person) was proficient, as that was mostly what they were reading in the units, and seemed reasonable.  The application of using different endings to the words to talk about self and others seemed like an advanced goal, for writing. So that was my rubric.  I also graded more holistically on a modified ACTFL rubric (basically this from Martina.)   

Now, I have been using this target structures rubric for four years, and never loved it.  What if they use two correctly and forget the third?  Wormeli would perhaps say that I should disaggregate the grade for each in the gradebook to give a better reflection of their learning.  Well, that is great if you are working on different skills in a different subject,  but since I know that language is acquired in messy chunks, and the stages of development are fixed and also messy, and that kind of feedback won't help with acquisition, disaggregating seems like a poor use of (my) limited time.

 Wormeli says that descriptive feedback is helpful. I am doubtful about this assertion regarding language acquisition, but I do see the value in showing students where they did or didn't meet the expectation.

What I changed: I decided to ask the kids.  I took 10 minutes of class and just told them what I was thinking, and asked if the target structures rubric was helpful for them.  They said that they wanted to know which words they were using at what level.  I suggested that I just give them feedback- a checklist and grade them holistically on the ACTFL rubric.

This is the new rubric- this DOES NOT go in the grade book!

It was so smooth for me to grade in this last round of writing, and they commented how useful it was to see what they were doing right.  So that's a keeper!!!

Proficiency levels

Posters on my classroom wall

The last thing that I decided to change up this week was to spend a little bit more time in L1 talking about proficiency levels.

I spend almost a whole day at the beginning of the year having students work on an activity that introduces them to proficiency levels. (See examples below.)  I will write about what I do more specifically- I even have a video- but for now, suffice it to say that I explicitly teach about the ACTFL levels at the beginning of the year, and discuss with kids and families what their goals are (for June).

I also use rubrics with proficiency levels on them already, and I do talk to the students about what they mean.  But am I doing it enough?  This is what I wanted to find out.

Proficiency Project in the hall
I do this at the beginning of the year
(Novice High)

Novice Low

Intermediate  Mid

I decided that after giving a writing quiz, I would take the kids out to the hallway where I have their proficiency level projects hanging.  I asked them to re-read their quizzes and mark on the rubric where they thought they were, proficiency-wise, based on the rubric and the examples we did at the beginning of the year.

Like this adorable cat that doesn't quite fit into his box, kids taught in comprehension based communicative
classrooms don't fit nicely into ACTFL levels.

Now, there is a MAJOR problem with this.  If you have been focused on providing compelling, comprehended input in your classes, you can probably guess what it is.  ACTFL proficiency levels, originally developed for a non-educational context, don't play nicely with kids who get tons of input and start writing paragraphs almost immediately.  They tend to skip novice low completely and speed through novice mid, at least in my experience and understanding.   Depending on the teacher, they might start writing paragraphs in a variety of time frames.
Yes, it is usually messy, but as Tina Hargaden reminds us, novice and intermediate writers need a sympathetic reader.  (And remember, there is no such thing as an error, only an indicator of the developmental stage the learner is in. Again, thanks to BVP for reminding me of this.) So is their writing indicative of micro-fluency, and thus they are really not intermediate low or mid?  Tina has a strong case for the opposite- that teachers constantly rate their students too low.  I am still really struggling with this, and have been for years.

That being said, is this a worthy struggle for me as a teacher?  Does it *really* matter if my kids are novice high or intermediate mid? It is probably not going to change what I do.  I am still going to give them a huge diet of comprehensible, comprehended input, including fiction, non-fiction, academic language, adapted authentic resources, music, etc.

I mean, common language is great but totally meaningless if other teachers have different interpretations of these same words.