When the hurly-burly’s done

Heading into the last day of the first quarter, it’s not a bad idea to take a few minutes, relax, and enjoy a masterpiece: Wes Montgomery performing Thelonious Monk’s “‘Round Midnight.”

Bonus track: The Brad Mehldau Trio doing Radiohead’s “Exit Music (For a Film).”

This week is the end of the first quarter, and also marks the end of our study of our first (!) major work of the year, Shakespeare’s Scottish Play. It’s been slow going, to say the least. I’ve never been able to figure out why a play that takes no more than three hours to perform has to take weeks to read, and as much as I’d like to be able to say that this year’s sophomores have made the study of the play so much slower than usual, I can’t.

It’s me. I know it.

I was torn, as I am every year, between treating the play as a script and going full-on with acting, and treating it like a piece of literature and going for analysis. In the end, neither approach won out. We read the play, watched excerpts from a couple of film versions, acted some scenes, and made some things. Below are a couple of examples from Monday’s wrap-up activity, which was to make underground fliers calling for revolution against Macbeth, incorporating quotes from the text and design elements reminiscent of 80s hardcore fliers and 90s ‘zines.

Today’s attempt at presenting memorized scenes didn’t exactly work–memorization is really hard, and the students were overwhelmed.  Chalking it up to poor timing and a difficult assignment, I took the Understanding Teacher Guy route and gave them today to rehearse (with my help, as I bounced around the room listening, quizzing, giving suggestions, waving a fake sword around) with the understanding that tomorrow’s the last day of the quarter and I need to get my grades in.  I’m either going to be really impressed or really disappointed tomorrow.

But I can’t stop thinking.

I sat in a room proctoring a PSAT for sophomores–SOPHOMORES–for which the school shelled out a bundle of money. Sophomores. PSATs are vaguely useful to the tiny percentage of kids who do extraordinarily well on them and might be National Merit Scholars. But the College Board only counts the scores of juniors.

Our school doesn’t pay for every junior to take the exam. (However, there is money available for juniors whose families can’t afford it.) We’re a highly affluent district, but we face budget cuts like every other district. The key is to spend money intelligently and efficiently while maintaining our reputation as a town with excellent public schools.

So the students spent three hours this morning taking an exam that doesn’t count for anything, and for which the school paid around $20/head. I can almost understand if it were a practice CAPT test–the district’s pretty psyched about getting more students to get better scores on that puppy–but a PSAT? Why? Who are we enriching aside from the College Board? Maybe the PSAT/SAT tutoring companies, because you better believe that there’s a lot of talk about that in my sophomore classes when the scores come back in December. Scores for an exam for which these students aren’t prepared (they haven’t had enough math yet).

And it started me thinking about priorities, and what’s important, and what I’d do if I were the boss of everything in a school district.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I love my job. It’s now the job at which I’ve worked longest in my life (I’m in my fourth year in the same school). There is rarely a day when I wake up and dread going to work. Oddly enough, those are usually days on which no students are in the building and we’ve got all-day Staff Development. I like reading with kids and helping them write authentically. I adore my colleagues. I’m grateful for the paycheck and the support.

I think we can be a great school. We can be the high school that we say we are, but aren’t yet. But we need to think a little differently.

The obvious issue is the whole state testing/NCLB thing. Let’s ignore the fact that I think NCLB is a racist, classist, antifederalist attempt to bleed our public schools until they’re abolished and every school is either profoundly expensive or is basically an American madrassah. The reality is that we’re stuck with it, which means that as a Connecticut high school, our students have to pass the 10th grade CAPT test in order to graduate.

Fine. But that can’t be everything. And if is everything, we need to keep a couple of things in mind:

1) CAPT’s reading section is a constructivist exam. It asks the students to read a short story and write four journal entries meant to illuminate the reading process. The questions are usually something along the lines of

What questions do you have about the story?

What is the significance of [a quote]?

Does this story remind you of anyone you know in real life, from other stories, etc?

Is this story a good piece of literature?

According to Wikipedia’s entry on constructivist teaching methods,

In the constructivist classroom, the teacher’s role is to prompt and facilitate discussion. Thus, the teacher’s main focus should be on guiding students by asking questions that will lead them to develop their own conclusions on the subject.

2) CAPT’s Writing Across the Disciplines section doesn’t say anywhere, in its instructions, that it requires a tradition five-paragraph essay structure, a thesis at the end of its first paragraph, etc. In fact, the task is usually to read a couple of articles with opposing viewpoints on the same issue and write a letter about your position on it. This is persuasive writing, but it’s not nearly as formalized as a lot of teachers would have their students believe.

Constructivism fits in nicely with Christian Long’s Future of Learning Manifesto. I know this isn’t a new document, but I’ve found myself reading it more and more often recently. I especially love #4:

4. Got Passion? If Not, I’ll Tell You What To Care About.

I have a right to bitch about this class only if I have a dream I can articulate and am willing to put my life on the line for it. Otherwise, I might as well color between the lines, sit up straight, and take great notes.

And get out to recess on time.

Keep in mind, I may be young so I may have a hard time with that “r-tickle-a-shun” thing. That’s your job. Give me the words. Give me the tools. Give me the examples. And then get out of my way.

But the second you see my passion start to go from curious lit match to smoke-jumper forest fire, stop giving me handouts and worksheets and become my Jerry McGuire.

And here’s where I really start thinking about what my ideal school will look like, sound like, smell like, taste like, feel like. It’s not going to be relentlessly high-tech and obsessed with the Newest & Shiniest. But it’s going to have computer access for every student who needs it, whenever those students need it. So maybe one computer per student is in order. And where will that money come from? From not spending it on silly things like the PSAT, fancy consultants that nobody’s going to listen to, computer programs nobody can access, wasting teacher resources in manning a desk to enforce an attendance policy that doesn’t exist, or countless other things.

But even if there were no computers available in the school, Christian’s vision is spot-on. I taught my sophomores a new word today, “self-sufficient.” When they asked what I meant, I advised them to use the resources they had to find out for themselves. The three or four of them in each class who got the joke lost it; the rest got that deer-in-headlights look I usually associate with politicians who accidentally stray off their scripts.

“But how do you teach self-sufficiency and passion?” I hear you asking.

“Through experience,” I reply. “By taking away the ‘training wheels’ that don’t turn. By not dictating how students have to structure their essays. By not standing for excuses for anything.”

“Sweet,” you reply, in the tone usually reserved for trying to extricate yourself from a conversation with the foaming man on the bus.

“Also, by example. By encouraging teachers to take some responsibility for themselves. By encouraging them to pursue their academic interests, participate in meaningful staff development, giving them a say in how the school is run. Top-down leadership results in a stagnant staff and passive students.”

You would reply, but you’ve already run away.

My ideal school would have a completely integrated curriculum–reading, writing, math, geography, history, science, art, music, etc would be crucial to EVERY class.  We don’t separate these skills in real life.  Why do we ask our students to do that?

My ideal school wouldn’t be afraid of the power of social networking.  Here’s Christian again (point #8):

Instead of shutting off every virtual connection I have with the world once I step onto campus, why don’t you teach me how to ‘blog smart’?  Why don’t you bring in some CEO’s into the classroom to talk about the really ‘great’ kid they almost hired, until they Googled her and found those clever spring break shots from Padre Island?  Why don’t you get a MySpace account and come see what I’m writing, even if it p***es me off at the moment?  Why don’t you make me agile, rather than weak?

Oh, and why are you asking my teachers to deliver a world class education for the 21st century knowledge economy but you’ve censored every virtual tool they have at their disposal?  Frankly, I’m not sure why they give a damn.  I wouldn’t if I were them.

But then I’d be blogging my brains out at home after I punched out at the end of the school day. And then become a consultant and get 10x the pay from the same superintendent who hired me to come in and do a professional development day when “blogging” was trendy for 5 minutes.

I plan to write a lot more about this, but I want to let it marinate a little.  I also really need to get to those essays, which I’m looking forward to reading.  My sophomores were asked to write something somehow connecting the “Buddha Boy” of Nepal to The Scottish Play.  Should be quite an evening…

Bill Richardson on education. There’s a lot of emotion here. I’m still not entirely sure who I’ll cast my vote for in the primary (as if the CT one actually matters), but I’m definitely going to read up more on Richardson. The rest of this speech is here (emphasis from Schools Matter):

My Democratic opponents have been cautious in confronting George Bush on this issue. Just as they trusted George Bush on the Iraq war and the Patriot Act, they trusted him on No Child Left Behind. The result has been a travesty for our children.

Some say fix it, others say tweak it. Senator Hillary Clinton says reform it.

I also have two words for No Child Left Behind: Scrap It…

The key to a good education is not narrow tests or Washington wisdom. The key is a good teacher in every classroom.

We need to attract and retain the best and brightest for our nation’s schools. We need to start treating teachers with the professional respect that they have earned.

When I am President, teachers will have a national average starting salary of $40,000. We will improve and expand teacher training … and strengthen standards and accountability. We will increase the number of nationally-certified teachers.

I will provide bonuses and create a loan forgiveness program for teachers who choose to work in under-performing and high-poverty areas.

I also commit to you that I will hire 100,000 new math and science teachers. It’s a simple equation — talented math and science teachers lead to inspired and successful math and science students. High-quality math and science education is not optional. It is essential to holding our position as the world’s leader of progress and hope. And I will set a national goal of making America number one in the world in math and science within fifteen years…

We should move from a pass/fail model to a more comprehensive system of measurement. Narrow tests will only create narrow people…

I took the long weekend off, leaving my GuiltBag in a drawer at work and resolving to relax, to clear my mind after a couple of very intense weeks. In between cleaning, commerce (I bought a vacuum cleaner, a bed frame, and one of those Ikea Poang chairs that are so comfortable you never want to stand up again–thanks, Craigslist!), and catching up with friends I hadn’t seen in ages, I read.

A lot.

First, I finished Atonement (which, appropriately enough, I began reading on Yom Kippur afternoon). I read my first Ian McEwan novel, On Chesil Beach, this summer in Scotland on a recommendation from Allyson, my writing tutor. She had me read it because it’s a great example of how to create tension from literally nothing happening. What kept me reading, though, and made me want to read more McEwan, was his writing style. McEwan’s an old-fashioned writery writer, relying on sumptuous and sensual description to carry the weight of his stories, which, from what I can tell so far, mostly take place in his characters’ internal lives. Check this out, from Atonement:

She went indoors, quickly crossed the black and white tiled hall–how familiar her echoing steps, how annoying–and paused to catch her breath in the doorway of the drawing room. Dripping coolly onto her sandaled feet, the untidy bunch of rosebay willow herb and irises brought her to a better state of mind. The vase she was looking for was on an American cherry-wood table by the French windows which were slightly ajar. Their southeast aspect had permitted parallelograms of morning sunlights to advance across the powder-blue carpet. Her breathing slowed and her desire for a cigarette deepened, but still she hesitated by the door, momentarily held by the perfection of the scene–by the three faded Chesterfields grouped around the almost new Gothic fireplace in which stood a display of wintry sedge, by the unplayed, untuned harpsichord and the unused rosewood music stands, by the heavy velvet curtains, loosely restrained by and orange and blue tasseled rope, framing a partial view of cloudless sky and the yellow and gray mottled terrace where chamomile and feverfew grew between the paving cracks. A set of steps led down to the lawn on whose border Robbie still worked, and which extended to the Triton fountain fifty yards away.

I love how McEwan writes so heavily and softly–the wood, textiles, and herbs are almost smellable in this scene. And the colors–don’t even get me started on the colors. This is writing that is a feast for the reader. I usually tear through novels, but I took my time with Atonement, even though it’s relatively short. I just couldn’t read huge chunks of it at a time without feeling like I’d just eaten a very big meal.

So I just said I’m a fast reader, and I think I proved it by swallowing all of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road yesterday. Literally. I was up at dawn–my sister spent Saturday night at my apartment, and I gave her my bed, leaving me with first the too-small couch, then the floor–so I just started reading, waiting until it wouldn’t be rude for me to make a lot of noise. The Road is definitely McCarthy’s fastest-paced book, but that doesn’t mean it’s an easy read–the premise itself is tough enough (a man and his young son travel across postapocalyptic America), and there are some scenes (cannibalism figures heavily in this book) that are going to haunt me for a while. But McCarthy’s style just moves in this one. While he’s been known to indulge in Faulknerian rhapsodies to candleflame and horses, McCarthy here is at his most taut:

He woke toward the morning with the fire down to coals and walked out to the road. Everything was alight. As if the lost sun were returning at last. The snow orange and quivering. A forest fire was making its way along the tinderbox ridges above them, flaring and shimmering against the overcast like the northern lights. Cold as it was he stood there a long time. The color of it moved something in him long forgotten. Make a list. Recite a litany. Remember.

So these two books are amazing, and totally different, and that leaves me in an interesting place as a writing teacher–for that’s what I’m beginning to consider myself, more than anything else.  It wasn’t a slip-up that I told the ENG212 parents on Thursday night that the class is a writing class where we happen to read some books.  But what do we do, when teaching writing, about style?  Is it appropriate to teach a specific formal writing style when students are writing analytically?  Is there such thing as one formal writing style?  And what, pray, do I do about my Creative Writing students?  Do I have a responsibility to show them examples of different writing styles, or will that just confuse them?

I got the final-ish draft of my short story from this summer, with Allyson’s comment, in Saturday’s mail.  I haven’t looked at it yet, but all of this reading and thinking about writing makes me want to.  I am not sure if I’m going to keep working on the story in the foreseeable future, but I’d kind of like to see it finished.  If that’s possible.