Be The Kid

Recently the ESL Department at my school had our first (since I’ve been there) departmental meeting with our supervisor. In the lead up to it, the veteran teachers groaned and warned about how “there’s always something” and were not looking forward to it. I didn’t really know what to expect.

As you may know by now, NYC Public Schools now receive a progress report that rates a school for the percentage of progress students make. Our school scored an A, and this meeting discussed some of the weaknesses and where we, as a school, needed to improve. One was in terms of data, so now we have to carry around the most recent running record for our students, for example.

Our supervisor also detailed some ideas she’d gotten from going for some professional development with Teachers College, with which our school is affiliated. One of the things was the suggestion to “be the kid” — during a read aloud that the classroom teacher is doing, rather than being in the front of the classroom, sometimes we should sit down with the kids and get a better sense of how they’re seeing/hearing/interpreting/discussing things. The other new teacher (more on her later) and I were really jazzed by this. The veterans were kind of like, “more work?”

This seems to be an essential question and crossroads for what kind of teacher I will become. It comes down to why someone I am a teacher and where I see myself in this career.

It seemed common sense that we should be trying to see things from a kid’s point of view but, for me, it’s especially crucial teachers try to get a sense of how ELLs (English Language Learners) see things. It never ceases to amaze me that non-ESL trained teachers in a predominantly ESL school (87% of the school are ELLs) wouldn’t pick up a few clues about how to work with ELLs. Like using visuals. Or enunciating and using gestures. Never assuming the kids know the meaning of words or phrases. Speaking slowly or waiting longer than normal after you ask a question. And these teachers wouldn’t have had to simply infer these techniques — there are specialists all around them and some of their teacher guides even provide tips. But, sadly, too many teachers either don’t care or think the kids are simply slow or problematic. (I’m not saying there aren’t teachers who simply don’t “get it” but I think that’d be a rare kind of ignorance in this kind of ELL-dominant school.)

And I’m only talking about younger kids — I realize the average classroom teacher, even in an ELL-dominant school, may not realize reading skills are not the same as language skills or that a student can be an advanced reader and have low language skills. But how about talking slowly? Enunciating? Using gestures? Not randomly yelling or being sarcastic to 6-year-olds — those should be normal things with English proficient kids, never mind ELLs. But that’s kind of a whole other story.

Back to my (first) main point. Be the kid. This is what a good teacher tries to do, no? — looks at a lesson and thinks to his/herself, “how does a 6-year-old think? how might they see this?” — and then observe the kids to learn that. This is an element of the kind of teacher I’m trying to be. I imagine a lot of the veteran teachers may have started out that way, but maybe not. Honestly, I’d rather not think all teachers just become jaded shells of their former selves who are just working toward that summer vacation or retirement. I do see glimmers of good teachers under that rot and rust, and I see solid, if tired, lesson plans and strategies, etc. I don’t want to just chalk it up to age either — I don’t think that’s fair or the whole picture. Most likely it’s a combination of things like age, frustration, not caring about the kids b/c they’re not your nationality, etc., and it’d be dangerous to generalize.

***While it’d be wrong to generalize, I am searching for more understanding on this because it really is frustrating. There are two examples of the kind of teachers who frustrate me:

1. Some of my fellow/veteran ESL teachers just recycle old lesson plans from years ago without differentiating for current student interests or strengths, or using flexible grouping. They group kids by their reading levels (i think) and try to move them forward as an homogenous entity. I know this is likely an “old school” approach that they’ve probably just gotten stuck in, but they show no concern or interest in learning about differentiation, which is discussed all around us, because it’d require more work. Ah, yes, planning. These ESL teachers actually complained to me that the school recently changed things so that they’re in the classrooms more! It used to be the case that they’d pull ESL teachers out of their routine to sub for teachers or proctor tests, etc., but not anymore. They actually were salivating over this one other veteran teacher who was given the option (I forget the circumstances) to go back to being a classroom teacher or become a sub (with full salary, benefits and pension) and he chose to be a sub. “No planning! No responsibility! Just go home! That’s the dream teaching job!” Sorry, but I don’t consider that teaching.

2. Speaking of not teaching. This is an example of the kind of teacher who doesn’t deserve the protection of tenure (I know that’s a complicated issue, but nonetheless…). The reading teacher who goes into the 2nd grade class I’m assigned to really shouldn’t be in a position where she as interaction with children, especially ESL kids. She yells at them, making threats they don’t know aren’t literal (like, “you’re all going back to kindergarten if you can’t remember what we did yesterday!) is sarcastic with them, literally rips books out of the hands of a child new to this country because she can’t “read with emotion” and is simply overbearing, mean and also shirks any requirements to actually teach. I understand teachers lose their patience, but I’m talking about a women’s constant personality. She has no appreciation for the fact that most of these kids sit there and “just stare” at her after she asks a question b/c they’re translating what she just said, then thinking of a response (often in their own language and then translating it back to English), and then formulating how to word it, pronounce it, etc., etc.

I do think it’s really important that the new teachers, myself included, have been trained in looking for ways to differentiate or constantly assess, or set high standards, and “be the kid”. If it was just me that felt this way, I’d be thinking right now that the NYC Teaching Fellowship was the idealist, hippie commune of a program that just wanted to set high goals with no sense of how a real school works. I definitely feel the opposite… even though I do also feel like it didn’t enough prepare me for some of the mechanics of teaching, or about teaching in an elementary school…

***This is only my first full week (I started on a Wednesday and the following week was Thanksgiving), and I’m really still pretty open-minded. I do blog my thoughts, criticisms and what-not, but I still don’t feel like “all the evidence is in” or anything on the teachers I’m observing/analyzing/writing about. And, just to be clear, I’m not one of those new young teachers who thinks “get rid of the old to make room for the new” — I don’t think these teachers are bad b/c they’re veterans.. or are stuck in old ways that are all completely bad, etc., nor do I think I have all the answers.