Update: 23 May 2008

What is your strategy for assuring students achieve the New York State Learning Standards in Social Studies?

1) I will be sure to cover the material, which means I must move swiftly. Seventh graders need to have finished the Civil War period by June. Eighth graders need to have finished US History by 30th April.

2) The marks in my class need to reflect the state standards (there is a three-four point difference for most students.). In all my writing tasks and exams, the rubrics are the NY state rubrics. Students are measured in class the same way they will be measured on the exams.

3) In eighth grade in January, we take a break from book work for a comprehensive review of US History to that point (should be World War II). After a five-day review, students take the previous year's NYS Intermediate Social Studies Exam. Questions on material we have covered count towards a midterm examination.

4) As a matter of continuous review, eighth graders are assigned Constructed Response test questions from old NYS exams once a week for 20 weeks. I arrange it so that almost everyone has a different paper each week.

5) There will be a comprehensive review of US History throughout the month of May for grade 8. Wherever possible there will be scheduled increased contact time for students in danger of scoring 1-2 on the state examination (To some degree, they will also have extra assignments, but there are some limiting considerations to take into account in doing so).

6) Students who are likely to earn only a 1 or 2 are addressed in AIS classes I give once or twice a week.[TOP]

Your teaching assignment bridges Middle School and High School. In what ways is ninth grade different than seventh and eighth in your class? I am very pleased with the chance to have students for three years. In this way, I can have a longer period to help them develop as learners. The latter half of grade eight and the Global Studies class in ninth grade is quite different from seventh: its design is intended to get students ready for independent high school work. It is different in the following ways:

1) Where in Middle School, I expose students to everything five times in five ways, in ninth grade there are only three to four exposures to material (something auditory like a multi-media presentation, reading, and an activity).

2) Where in Middle School I proscribed certain reading-study strategies, in ninth, students select from strategies which work best for them in a strategic reading plan. Their homework is to complete these plans.

3) The monthly exams are all short response style; a sort of mini-essay. Possible questions are distributed in advance.

In general, the best preparation I can give them is to encourage the development of an independent learner.[TOP]

Your class does not include a lot of projects or trips. You never show whole movies. How come? The demands of this curriculum are significant: students have to learn a lot of material in a short period of time. Each activity we do must be judged based on how much we get out of it for the time applied to it. I can teach students the amount they learn (that is, actually retain) from a 2-hour movie in about 15 minutes. I would like to take more trips to local historic sites of interest and I am planning to, but there has to be time.

Please remember that students and I are evaluated based on how well the students reach the NYS standards. We could take a nice trip to Fort Ti and the kids would enjoy it, but I am faced with the reality that what they learn there is only marginally reflected in the state exam. There might be one question on the French and Indian war, maybe two. Is that worth a day outing when students are also out of their other classes for the trip? Not always.

The "juice has to be worth the squeeze" when it comes to things like that. I have arrived at the end of the year not having covered what I needed to and rushed through things. Student retention of material is very poor when it's rushed.

Time is set aside in each lesson for more entertaining activities like debates and skits and games and improvised scenes.[TOP]

It seems like you grade hard and your monthly exams are difficult. Why is that? I'm not sure how true it is that I "grade hard". I have revisited some student work that I graded and felt later that I was too easy-going. However, I do consider my exams and essays challenging. The reason is that the measures that make up the most important part of the student's mark (65% of the grade are called "high order tasks") are based on the NYS Learning Standards for Social Studies. The rest is pretty much fluff: participation grades, homework grades, etc.

In the Fall of 2006, I studied students' performance on the 8th grade Social Studies exam given each June from 2001 to 2006 (I have taught Social Studies here since 2004). I compared our students to students in Johnsburg, Minerva, and Willsboro: three similar districts in size, wealth, and geographic region. Of more than 500 students who took the Intermediate Social Studies state exams in 8th grade in all 4 schools since 2001, only 61% have passed. A painful statistic for me was seeing that they earned on average 10.9 points lower on the state exam than in my class for a year. It told me I had better align my grades more carefully with the standards. At the moment, I am shooting for a seven point variance between what a student earns in my class and what s/he would earn on the state exam. That is, subtract seven from the grade in the course and you will see your child's likely score on the state exam.

In 2006-2007, I implemented strategies designed to bring my course and grading system in more close alignment with the state standards. The difference between a final grade in my class and on the state exam was only 3 points on average in June 2007 and 90% of students passed the exam. [TOP]

Aren't we a little too test driven in this state? Does it force you to teach to the test? I have never thought we are too test driven, but I do regret as a matter of personal opinion that everyone is forced down mostly the same track. For decades, we had a two-tiered system of exams: Regents and Regents Competency. I think the trend toward a single exam for everyone is misguided and has a limited lifespan. In general, though, I strongly favor state testing and setting standards for teachers and students to meet. These must be reasonable, though. The current standards are not reasonable for all kids and schools are often penalized for things over which they have no control.

[TOP]

It seems like seventh grade is a real shock to students moving from sixth grade. Their grades go down a lot and a few of the kids getting 80s and 90s last year only sometimes get 70s in your class. How come? The difference between the two levels is startling and I think could be relieved in some ways through scheduling. I am not sure how aligned elementary grades are or even can be with the state learning standards. However, the difference in marks that some students experience could be attributed to many factors, including which is the necessity to become organized and more independent.[TOP]

What are your thoughts on homework? I go by the old rule of thumb: 10 minutes times the grade level. If a seventh grader is working more than 70 minutes every night on homework, there is something seriously wrong with our system. In the face of state testing standards, some teachers throw a lot of homework at kids. I'm not sure this is always justified.

Each activity I ask my students to do can be categorized on a scale called Bloom's Taxonomy: Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, Evaluation. Most homework I assign is on the first two or three levels: memorizing facts, understanding ideas, etc. I quiz a lot, I send home few or no worksheets. Studying for a quiz should not take more than 15 minutes. Everything of importance I like to do in class. I almost never assign homework over weekends or vacations.[TOP]

You are really big into teaching students how to learn. Don't you think there should be a class in this? I taught a 10-week course in How to Learn to seventh graders at Crown Point School for seven years. The truth is, only higher-performing students and a few well-motivated middle-performing students benefit much from study skills training. Low performing students often have little motivation to apply study methods: it always seems like too much work to them.[TOP]

Why did you quit teaching French? I taught a lot of history in French, even starting at level 2. It was a method I used to teach language: students learn to talk about history, arts, literature, etc in French. It dawned on me one day that I enjoyed teaching the content more than teaching the language, although I still have a great love of languages. In some ways, perhaps I needed another challenge.[TOP]

What kinds of accommodations do you make for special needs students? The term "special needs" students in my classroom easily extends to everyone in some way. Besides the accommodations provided in the IEP and 504 plans designed by the Committee on Special Education, I have experimented with adaptations where I felt there was undue interference in allowing me to measure what a student knows. For example, I have had kids who had severe difficulties with the motor skills needed to form letters and put them on the page. I experimented with having them record their responses to short test questions. My experience is that students with determination can often overcome some limitations. The Differentiated Instruction model I use in my classroom permits learners of a wide variety to access the information and skills that are part of the course.

That said, I feel it important to mention that not every child is ready or willing to pursue a Regents-level, college prepatory education and I do not believe they all should. We must have an education system that seeks to actualize the potential of all of our citizens. The current Education Department strategy of preparing everyone for college is flawed. It is flawed because it assumes any other type of preparation is of less value. It is flawed because all children cannot excel in all subjects. The financial resources alone required for this endeavor are straining local school budgets and the cost of special education is not discussed because it is taboo. Rather than spend thousands to force kids into a mold neither they nor their parents accept, why not use the funds to give people the opportunity to further their interests at the level they are capable and in a field they are motivated to excel and contribute as citizens?

I am supportive of special education and its role in reducing or eliminating handicap to permit a student to reach his or her potential. I wear glasses myself and would be upset if I could not wear them to take a driver's test. Testing and program modifications are to create equality of opportunity. However, I strongly believe we must be wary of confusing this with equality of result, to which I believe students are not entitled.[TOP]

What do you you think of grouping students by ability? I don't think tracking is as much an important issue as we have always made it out to be. When I started my career, I was all for mixed grouping and frowned on ability grouping as some sort of elitism or Social Darwinism. I was adamant about it. Now I wish I could go back and concede defeat in the debates I had with elder teachers at the time. I see grouping strategies as useful at times.

Some teachers feel that students grouped by ability will cause the lower-performing group to feel less capable and confident, will cause an increase in behavior problems in the lower-performing group as they feed off one another, and will cause teachers to challenge them less based on lower expectations. Mixed grouping has not solved these problems, however. Confidence is built on success, which must come from hard work and a teacher designing lessons that show success. Behavior problems are addressed with a strong behavior management plan, not grouping (The kids with behavior problems just misbehave in any class). Teacher low expectations can be reversed with a strong standardized testing system and a self-awareness and reflection.

I have taught both mixed ability groups and homogeneously grouped kids. Good instructional practice should work and adapt to either case. In some subjects at some levels, grouping is vital to maximize student's benefit from the instructional time. The differences between males and females in early adolescence have made me wonder whether gender segragation would be useful for grades 7-9.

In a situation where I have grouped kids in my class, I have had them select the group they were in.[TOP]

Hey! My child handed in an assignment, but it does not appear on the weekly progress report! The work is probably in progress - check the print date on the progress report. Papers take 3 days to process typically (I process around 400 a week) and your son or daughter probably handed the paper in and it's waiting for review. [TOP]