Why didn't they tell me I didn't need to be on time for work?

Tuesday of this week we had  a meeting after school. Most of our meeting was about where we are with preparing for the SACS accreditation visit next year, but there was a little bit on the end where the principal let everyone know that the following day (Wednesday) those who had over 20 lates would have a note in their cubby and would need to talk to him. We have a finger scanner that logs us "entrada" or "salida" from the school. Everyone is supposed to have "fingered in" by 7:15. School starts at 7:30. The school record for lates this year was somewhere around 84.
Supposedly the teachers who had over 20 lates had a meeting Tuesday evening and agreed to not sign whatever was going to be presented to them in their meeting with the principal. You could hear teachers around school on Wednesday griping about how unfair this was for  administration  to make their tardiness part of their official record.
It was almost like it was the administration's fault for them being late. I heard bits of one conversation between someone who is never late and someone who had in excess of 70 lates. It went something like this:
Over 70 Lates, 'It is terrible that the administration never warned us about this.'
Never Late: 'You didn't know you were supposed to be at school on time?'
Over 70 Lates: 'Yes, I knew I was supposed to be on time, but I didn't know I would be threatened if I wasn't.'
Never Late: 'Didn't you know the finger machine was keeping a record of when you arrive?"
Over 70 Lates: 'Yes, but I didn't know that after 20 lates they would threaten me.'
Never Late: 'So you thought you could be late as many times as you wanted and there would be no consequences.'
Over 70 Lates: 'Yes, or they would warn me.'
Never Late: 'What was the meeting with the principal about?'
Over 70 Lates: 'Warning me that if I continue being late it could affect my being rehired.'
Never Late: 'Isn't that what you just said you thought they would do?'
Over 70 Lates: ' Yes, but I didn't know they would write anything down.'

Maybe there is some logic in "Over 70 Lates" thinking.  After 35 years in this business, working in 9 different schools as a teacher, I always thought my being punctual for work would be part of my work record. Why didn't somwbody tell me I didn't need to be on time for work?

T-Shirts & Making the Cut

This morning I rummaged to the bottom of my t-shirt pile categorizing as I rummaged. Most of the t-shirts went in to the "to be given or thrown away when leaving Honduras" pile. The t-shirt on the bottom was my "BaysDay" t-shirt. When I worked at Goldsmiths College in London, we had our 1st year science students be guides for groups of kids that attended the BaysDay event at Imperial College. The objectives were for the students to be aware of this annual science event for primary age kids and to get some experience with managing kids on a field trip. There were a few side objectives like picking up some science content  from the activities they attended with their group. After our teacher trainee students got over the initial shock of having to cover the transport costs from southeast London to Kensington (about $10) , they generally reported a great experience, and they got a t-shirt and free lunch. I wonder how many remember the experience and have ever taken their own class to the event. (I just tried to Google "BaysDay" and can't find out if it is still happening.) Unfortunately this t-shirt I'm wearing is going in the 'to be left behind' pile, but since I went to BaysDay 3 years, I should have a couple more someplace.
On Friday the school here had Family Day. There was a real admin push to buy the "Family Day" t-shirt. Whenever there is an event here, there seems to be a t-shirt that accompanies the occasion. I escaped buying the "Family Day" t-shirt by making a belated plea that somebody consider having a commemortaive cap or handkerchief for the event. As I was sorting t-shirts this morning and considering if any of the half dozen EILL t-shirts I have collected while here will make the cut and be in a suitcase going back to the USA in June, I came across my coach's t-shirt from my time as the girls' basketball coach. It has my name embroidered on it. I figured that  automatically makes it a keeper. The downside is it is it is made of that slick polyester material which makes it very uncomforable to wear. I can picture the box in the attic  where it will end up. Something for my kids to sort through  after I am gone when they have to do something with all the t-shirts and stuff that have made the cut through the years. I think I remember putting a BaysDay t-shirt in that box.

Mentally Checking Out, Family Day, and the Here & Now

I just finished lesson plans for next week and sent them off to the principal and posted them on my page on the school's internet communication system. Friday will be the 1st of April. There is not long to go now!! Next week will be a grade collecting week. I need to put some grades in the gradebook. I am beginning to mentally check-out but feel I need to collect some data for the grade-machine monster before I can really coast to bimester exam review (May 16th).  For me it is very hard not to mentally check-out months in advance especially when you start packing what is going back to the USA and what will be sold or given away here. That started two weekends ago.

In 30 minutes the Spanish department's assembly will start to launch Family Day. We've already had a morning of classes and after the hour long (or less, hopefully) assembly the rest of the school day will be devoted to eating local food (which wll include everything from pupusas to corndogs) and playing games to win little plastic prizes.It is called Family Day because all the students extended families are invited to come and buy food and play the games.  I've got a one hour shift hosting the 'Grand Prize Game' (kids try to throw a ping pong ball into a bucket) and 2 hour shift selling drinks. The day turns out being fun. My big problem will be how to navigate my responsibilites, so I can sit down occasionally because at my age if I spend 3 hours on my feet, I won't be able to walk tomorrow. I suppose my aching feet will keep me focused on the here and now.

Colonel Klink, The Hidden Curriculum, & 8 Weeks until the Games Over

It's a rainy Monday as the last 8 weeks of my teaching career begins. The 8th grade is debating environmental issues and showing me what environmental confusions I should focus on for the last few weeks, e.g. littering and its relationship to global warming. The 7th grade is considering disasters and if there is anything to prophesies about world ending events happening on Dec.21, 2012. The 6th grade has packed up their science fair projects, taken them home, and launch into the study of the solar system combined with learning about Newton, gravity, and the laws of motion. The big ideas here are: 8th grade - environmental issues usually have at least 2 sides and multiple issues involved, 7th grade - the world is a fragile changing system in a much bigger universe and we need to understand it and take responsibility for the parts we can affect, and 6th grade - the solar system is held together by certain fundamental laws and is both big in relation to Earth and small in relation to the universe and filled with many mysteries.
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Rainy mornings seem to sap everyone's motivation. My wife and I were counting class days over breakfast this morning like kids counting the days until Christmas. I have 4 weeks until spring break and then a couple of weeks before final exam preparation begins. Time to focus and stop these "what's the point" thoughts that creep into my consciousness. The right spark in the right place can make the difference.

I just read  some of my first blogs (particularly Neeharika's email in "What's the Point"). I don't control enough  of this school to make a significant difference in the daily experience beyond a 45 minute science class. A school rule has teachers policing students speaking Spanish during breaks and lunch. If students are caught speaking Spanish they can get a detention. (I give them a chance to write an essay or lose team points.) It puts a weird atmosphere on recess duty, though. The goal is understandable but the method to try to acheive the goal has some sad consequences. The students shift to English when they see a teacher coming. I feel a little like Colonel Klink in Hogan's Heroes. Whenever I get near, the look-out shouts the warning and they fold up all their escape plans.

I'm not sure why I took that little detour in this blog except I'm struggling with this idea that the whole school experience needs to have an overall beneficial effect on the attitude of the student and something like enforcing a rule like speak English on campus can end up undermining efforts to make the academic activities motivating and engaging. I think I read a book once a long time ago on the importance of the "hidden curriculum".

It's thirty minutes to game time. Shoes laced. The old guy needs to check that all zippers and buttons are fastened and no extremely unsightly nose or ear hair is showing. Computers are on, PowerPoint is loaded, and hand-outs ready. Game on.

Arne Duncan, NCLB, & 82% of U.S. Schools Get an F

I receive an email newswire from The Center for Education Reform. Last week (March 15th, 2011) the one I received had an article in which it claims the Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, said 82% of US schools are on track to be failing under current No Child Left Behind (NCLB) guidlines. I haven't had to play the NCLB game in awhile, but I remember when I first saw that legislative rubbish from the administration of George W. Bush. I thought there is no way anyone with any statistical training had a look at  this mess. The requirement for continuous annual improvement (or some such jargon) ensures that eventually every school will regress toward the mean - and eventually fail. Hopefully someday somebody will realize a schools success should not be measured by how much kids improve on a standardized test from year to year, but on how motivated the kids have become to improve their lives through education and how schools are doing at facilitating and directing that motivation.

My Last Science Fair - Dedicated to Lawrence Bellipanni

My feet are aching. The projects are all down and the hands-on materials back in the science lab closet. The kids have tucked their ribbons in their top pocket with enough showing so everyone can see they won. I'm trying to think of a science fair where my feet didn't ache at the end. None are coming to mind. It's one of those good aches, though. Not one caused by standing in a pointless line, but an ache with a result. Kids enjoyed doing an experiment, self -evaluating what they did, presenting it to judges, and showing it off to visitors. They have had fun doing science.
 During my doctoral studies Lawrence "Larry" Bellipanni inspired me with his enthusiasm for science fairs. I just Googled Lawrence Bellipanni and read that he died last year. I've read his obituary over a few times and it has me a bit stunned. He was someone I thought for sure I would share some science fair stories with under an old oak tree dripping with moss on the Mississippi Gulf Coast one day.
When I was a lecturer in primary science education at Goldsmiths College, as a project the 3rd year science specialists started science fairs in schools around London. We would have a culmintaing event bringing the winners from all the schools to Goldsmiths for a day of science activities. The popularity of science as a specialty area grew as a result of such projects. I wanted to tell Larry how his influence had stretched across an ocean. Maybe someday at the great science fair in the afterlife universe.

Sluggards, David Foster Wallace, & Piaget

Over the past week I have had a few conversations about the nature of the school's current 7th grade class. One teacher who taught them last year confessed that he just found them "hard to like". I knew exactly what he meant. That very day I had given them their term exam and as I monitored the exam, I went down the rows of students and ticked off in my mind if they seemed to care at all about what I was teaching. Half I ticked off as not caring. At the time I thought, 'For most of them what is there to really care about - balancing chemical equations, the nature of acids & bases, physical properties of matter and how to calculate density.' Really - who cares? I felt kind of lucky that I had ticked off half that did seem to care. But now I was thinking it wasn't just the ultimate uselessness for most of them of what I was teaching. It was an attitude of not caring that permeated all their studies. I thought back to my science lab partner (a very creative and energetic elementary science teacher) from 2 years ago who had this group in 5th grade. She used to come back to the lab after a class with them complaining of how frustrating it was to try anything "fun". An element in the class would be intentionally obtuse or disruptive and prefer the putative peer approval for their shenanigans over any possible 'fun' they could have in learning something. Yesterday I was talking with the 6th grade/art teacher about what she would be teaching next year. She said they wanted her to teach 8th grade, but she really didn't want that group. The conversation took the same turn toward their attitude that made it hard to like teaching many of them.
What to do with this group for the last 9 weeks of my teaching career has been playing in my mind for a week now as I plan my last term. Today, as I was googling somethings I had made note of while reading Chabon's Manhood for Amateurs, I came across David Foster Wallace's 2005 commencement address to a college class ( http://moreintelligentlife.com/story/david-foster-wallace-in-his-own-words ). The ultimate message was about choosing to "stay conscious and alive in the adult world day in and day out". Institutionalized education should be a major part of the foundation preparing you to remain aware and skillfully alive in one's approaching adulthood. Wallace talks about finding a type of cognitive control. He calls it freedom. He refers to one type as 'the freedom to be lords of our tiny skull-sized kingdoms, alone at the centre of all creation.' This is where I think a lot of the 7th graders are. They have embraced this "kingdom". Soon (hopefully for most of them) they will begin to become aware of the approaching responsibilities of adulthood, but for now the more important freedom Wallace exposited ('the freedom that involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people') is beyond them.
I'm now thinking I should end the year with how I start the 8th grade school year - exploring Piaget's stages of cognitive development. Let them test some of the pre-schoolers with Piaget conservation tasks. Give them a concrete operations perspective task, and then let them try to work out the factors that effect the rate of swing of a pendulum. The goal would be that by experiencing how their brain is developing cognitive functions, the thought will germinate that they need to pay attention to the direction and pace of the development of their thinking. Probably the ones that get it will be the half who already care and the other half will remain blissful in their 'skull-sized kingdom'. Most of them will at least have some fun playing with the pre-schoolers when they give the conservation tasks.

When the 10,000 Year Clock Stops

Over the weekend I finished Manhood for Amateurs  by Michael Chabon. One of his stories "The Omega Glory" was a little unsettling for me as I am about to teach an earth science unit with the 7th grade where we look at possible earth shattering disasters. They are very much aware of the significance now attached to Dec.21, 2012, and what some would like us to believe is a prophesy of doom. We watched the movie "2012" last week to start the unit. Chabon's story/essay expresses his hope that we are not losing 'belief or interest in the Future'. When I teach the unit I give my opinion that the Mayan's saw 12/21/12 as the end of a calendar, and the overwhelming majority of Mayan scholars do not see this as a prediction of the end of the world. If there is a consensus on a Mayan prediction, it is that there will be a "New Age". I kind of picture what we used to back in the 60's call the "Age of Aquarius". I actually thought we had already had that back in the 60's and then "The Age of Disco" took over. Anyway ...
I do try to give the students facts about the fragility of our planet, though. There are some scientific theories (fact is a very hard word to use in science) that indicate we are approaching the peak of teh 11 year cycle of solar activity in 2012 and that the magnetic fields of the sun and earth will be lined up in a way that they haven't been before during this peak. The equinoxes (not the Dec. 21 solstice) is supposed to be the time when this solar activity might have its most profound effect on us in terms of communication and power disruptions. Unless your life is dependent on your GPS or cell phone or having electricity when this event happens you probably will survive. I have a hard time thinking of when my life is dependent on these things. Our power went off Sunday for 12 hours. I had to take a shower with a bucket of water I keep handy for when the power goes off and use candles to finish reading Chabon's book, but otherwise my life was pretty much the same. Disruption of water supply for a couple of weeks could have severe effects. The fear mongering folks who talk about the lining up of the planets seem to be wrong. Check out the website "Solar System Live" at http://www.fourmilab.ch/cgi-bin/Solar/action?sys=-Sf and move the date to 12/21/12 and you'll see the planets are not lined up as much as they are at other times. There are also conflicting theories about if the earth is in more danger as the solar system drifts to the center of the galaxy or pops above the galaxy and is subjected to more cosmic radiation. We discuss all kinds of earth ending disasters from our galaxy exploding to extinction of phytoplankton. Chabon's article had me worryiong that I was taking away hope for a future from these kids. This is certainly not my goal. The goal is our planet is fragile and we need to take care of it and use our minds and scientific methods to think about preserving it and eventually (thousands of years from now) leave it. But we need to start planning for that now and we need new young scientists.
Chabon felt this 10,000 year clock (as do the designers of the clock - The Long Now Organization http://longnow.org/clock/ ) would cause people to think slowly, critically, and creatively about a very distant future and instil a hope in what that future will be. If you saw my plans from yesterday's blog, I have a week at the end of the semester on "Visions of the Future". Often these lesson gets bumped because of previous content I didn't cover. This year I'll make seeing the future a priority - and we'll think about what the world will be like when the Long Now Clock stops.

The Last of the Last Semester Syllabi

Below is the rough planning for the last semester. We are supposed to turn this into the asst. principal by March 24th. I turned it in this morning. A younger colleague looked at me after I handed it in and commented, 'That is the last semester planning you will ever hand in.!?' There seemed to be a bit of a sense of wonder in his comment/question. I imagine there was a part conscious and a part unconscious rumination going on inside his head about when and where he might be when he hands in his last semeter plans.

6th Grade Science 4th Bimester Syllabus

Week March 14th: Science Fair
Week March 21st: Newton’s Laws of Motion, Velocity Calculations
Week March 28th: Solar System
Week of April 4th: Most Interesting Thing in the Solar System, Research & PowerPoint/ Position Paper
Week of April 11th: Stars and Galaxies
Week of April 26th: Most Interesting Thing in the Solar System Presentations
Week of May 2nd: Gravity & Flight
Week of May 9th:Visions of the Future
Week of May 16th: Review and Bimester Exam

7th Grade Science 4th Bimester Syllabus
Week March 14th:Earth Changing Events (e.g. earthquakes, disasters, floods, asteroid collision, global warming, …), Dec.21, 2012 - End of a Mayan Calendar or Prophesy?, Research and prepare PowerPoint and report.
Week March 21st:Our Planet – Inner Core to Outer Atmosphere, Latitude and longitude
Week March 28th: Prime Meridian,Time Zones, Calculate Length of Day
Week of April 4th: Earth Changing Events Presentations
Week of April 11th: Stars & Galaxies, Light Year, Scientific Notation
Week of April 26th: Earth Week, Debate Environmental Issues
Week of May 2nd: Visions of the Future, Space Travel, Velocity and Acceleration
Week of May 9th:Review all calculations: periodic table, density, balancing equations, length of day, scientific notation, velocity and acceleration
Week of May 16th: Review & Bimester Exam

8th Grade Science 4th Bimester Syllabus
Week March 14th: Environmental Issues, Research and prepare debate report.
Week March 21st: Individual student debates
Week March 28th: Earth Week Preparation, Research and prepare a PowerPoint on a Foundation
Week of April 4th: Carbon and Water Cycles, Phytoplankton Extinction
Week of April 11th: Earth Week Foundation Presentations, Scientific Notation
Week of April 26th: Earth Week
Week of May 2nd: Visions of the Future
Week of May 9th: Bimester Review, Review all calculations: (periodic table, density, balancing equations, scientific notation, velocity and acceleration), Exam

Peace, Love, & Ice Skates

Today is Saturday market day in La Lima. I've been here 3 years and just found the Saturday market this year. I love these local markets. Lome', Togo, was the best - complete with voodoo fetishes, but the people really hassled you to buy stuff. While I was in Lome' they opened a new market outside town. I went there once with a plan I thought guaranteed I would be left alone to wander free of a hassling helper. Lome' is about 6 degrees N latitude. With about 70 miles to a degree of latitude that is 420 miles north of the equator. It is at sea level. It is really hot most of the time. When it is not really hot, it is at bestwarm. (There is often a nice breeze off the Gulf of Benin, though.)
My plan was that whenever someone approached me to ask what I was looking for I would say,  "Ice skates". My French is pretty bad, but I made sure I could pronounce ice skates correctly. As soon as I walked through the gates into the market, someone was by my side asking what I was looking for, and without a  moment's hesitation after I said ice skates, he grabbed me by the hand and led me to a stall that had 3 pairs of ice skates. Thank goodness none were my size.
People hardly ever hassle you here at markets. Occasionally in the tourist market in San Pedro (Guamalito) the booth operators will try to stop you to tell you they have a special good price for you and ask what you are looking for. By now I know which person to go to for the usual Honduran gift items I like (hammocks and Lenca pottery). I've learned my lesson, though. If I am just wandering the booths, I don't ask for ice skates. My reply here is "paz y amor" (peace and love). Occasionally there is the booth operator who is pretty sure that a heavily lacquered wooden toothpick holder with the Honduran flag on it will bring me, "paz".

Iguana, Guinea Pigs, & a Surprise Free Period

It's Thursday afternoon and the pre-algebra teacher has just told me that the pre-algebra group (whom I teach basic skills on Thursday afternoon) already had math today because of a PE scheduling change due to the national soccer tournament.
The student I tutor in math has just shown up because she doesn't go to PE. Usually in the afternoon the lady who cleans my room is here while I tutor. We all chat a bit and the topic of eating algarrobos (iguanas) has come up. The discussion between the cleaning lady and myself began last year when I started a garden with the 6th grade and a major infestation of algarrobos ate everything we planted except citrus trees.The cleaning lady offered to cook any algarrobos I was able to catch. I didn't catch any. This year we joked about eating algarrobos as she cleaned my room and the student I tutor joined in saying her grandfather fixed good algarrobo. Today she brought me a sample. It was a bit of a cross between rabbit and fish with a little gator flavor thrown in. Her grandfather prepared it with a slightly sweet brown sauce with coconut flavoring - not unlike an Indian Korma. There were 3 algarrobo eggs on the plate. They were hard and not much flavor. My student just told me I shouldn't have eaten the whole egg. Oh well, if there are no blogs after today, you will know the reaon - a fatal overdose of iguana eggs.
This now ranks up there with the time I had guinea pig at a wedding in Ecuador. While living there I became friends with the fantastic primitve artist Julio Toaquiza Tigasi. When he would come to Quito, he would stay with me. One time he showed up with his whole family and invited me to the wedding of his son, Alfredo. I took the multi-bus journey to his house en Tigua. The party was fantastic. There was a band and dancing with special steps that the gringo never got exactly right which caused everyone to laugh and insist on drinking a shot of aguardiente with me. This made getting the dance right even harder. I could see and smell a roast lamb on a spit and as dinner time approached I was very much looking forward to a nice piece of lamb with some roast potatoes. Instead as a quest of honor I was presented with a roasted cuy (guinea pig) on a stick. It was certainly the tastiest guinea pig I ever ate.

Helping Students who Don't Want to Be in School

Monday I had a student taking a make-up test. I accidentally passed him the completed test of a student who took the test last week. After about 10 minutes the student taking the make-up test raised his hand and told me I gave him the other student's test. I noticed he had filled in the answers to all the balancing equation problems but didn't have any indication of how he worked them out. I asked him if he did them himself. He said, "Yes." I cut the 5 balancing equation problems off the test and gave him 5 different equations to balance. He couldn't do any of them. He ended up doing none of the problems on the test. I told him that I needed to see him at recess. I started him on the classwork the rest of the class was doing (creating a graph and predicting results when given an experimental question and a data table). He started playing around and laughing with the student next to him. I moved him to  a desk by himself. He completed the graph with several errors. When I tried to explain the errors to him, he looked away and  paid no attention - until I told him, "It is clear to me that you don't want to be here, and I am going to help you make that wish come true." He looked at me with a puzzled look on his face. I said, 'There is no need for you to be here if you don't want to, so I am going to help you.' He said a little hesitantly, 'I want to be here.' I said, 'Yes, you feel you have to say that, but let me help you. Look at all the kids in the class working and trying to learn. They want to be here. There's no reason someone who doesn't want to be here should take time from them. At recess we are going to go to the office and I am going to help you get what you want.' His argument then became 'I didn't cheat. You gave me the other student's test.' At recess he sauntered into my class after having been to the cafeteria to get a bottle of (highly) sweetned tea.
Today he wasn't in class. I haven't heard what happened. I'm glad I was able to help him. The rest of the class reached a new level of effort and cooperation today, also.