Guided Math

A few days ago, I heard about guided math, I didn't know what it was, so I have decided to research it a little bit.

It is very important to research things that you do not know because you can learn something that you had never known you needed to know before.

Guided math is similar to guided reading.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with either (I, too, was in that category), the teacher sets up a bunch of stations that teach the same topic.  An example of this is the week on fractions.  Each station would enforce the idea of fractions.  For example, one station could have a bunch of cut-out pizzas, another could have jelly beans that need to be divided into four equal parts.

The idea is to help students become independent learners for that particular topic.  In the beginning and the end of the week is a whole-group lesson teaching about the idea that will be reinforced through the stations.

I can see a big upside to teaching math in this way, because I am weird and a big advocate for project-based learning, this is, I feel, the closest thing to project-based learning that our public schools can get to.  Independence in learning is imperative to the skill of lifelong learning.

And as I begin this new stage of life as a special education teacher, I remember my roots and beliefs, and start with a fresh start and a new outlook on teaching and education.

Name-Change

I am going to have to change the name of my blog now.  I am no longer a future special ed teacher, I am a current special education teacher.  But I don't know, I might just leave it the same, or I might have to leave it the same because I can't change the title.  But I will still use this account.

Judge: Florida Teacher Who Soaked Autistic Kid's Crayons in Hot Sauce Should Get Job Back - Yahoo!

Judge: Florida Teacher Who Soaked Autistic Kid's Crayons in Hot Sauce Should Get Job Back - Yahoo!:

I am not going to lie, my first reaction to this story was, "What is the big deal?"  Comparing a woman who forces her child to drink hot sauce versus a teacher who is trying to help a student with autism stop eating crayons by putting them in hot sauce is overdoing it a bit.

However, upon deeper ponderation (not an actual word, according to spellcheck, which is also not a word.), I realized that the special education teacher messed up in one area.  We, as teachers, are required to be behavior managers, help manage behavior of students.

The first thing we need to do is figure out what is the function of that behavior.  I cannot say for guaranteed truth that the function of the behavior of putting a crayon in your mouth is to gain sensory, but that is what my hypothesis is (and that is all that a functional behavior assessment asks, the best hypothesis).  So, the child with autism wanted sensory feeling of putting a crayon in his mouth.

Here is where my path would diverge from the teacher's path.  The teacher just wanted to stop that behavior.  While that is a good idea, it is only part of the best practice.  In order for us to be the best behavior managers that we can be, we need to replace the negative behavior that we are trying to get rid of with a positive one that still serves the same function.

Now, looking at the fact that he likes to put things in his mouth suggests to me that he has was gaining an oral sensory thing.  What other things can go in the mouth that are socially acceptable and won't hurt the student?  For one, we could give him a sucker.  But suckers have calories, so I would have to talk to his parents to see if that is an option in their minds.  Another option might have been giving him sucking candy, there are low-calorie sucking candy.  With all of these ideas, I would want to talk to the parents before I do an intervention.

So, moral of this story, great behavior management is not about only stopping one behavior, it is about replacing that one behavior that we think is socially unacceptable with a behavior that is socially acceptable and gives the student the same thing as socially unacceptable behavior.

Man refuses to leave jail; cited for trespassing and sent back to prison | The Sideshow - Yahoo! News

Man refuses to leave jail; cited for trespassing and sent back to prison | The Sideshow - Yahoo! News:

I want to comment on this and talk about a concept that doesn't makes much sense to me with regards to punishment.

According to this article, a man was arrested after being cited for trespassing because he refused to leave jail.  Let's think about this idea, the man doesn't want to leave jail, so he stays, and he is arrested and sent to jail.  That's the jist.

Jail, in our society, in most societies, is supposed to be negative.  Jail is supposed to be a punishment for everyone.  The reality is, though, that jail may be the only roof over someone's head.  One of our most important needs according to Maslow's hierarchy of needs is shelter/warmth.

I don't know anything about this man, but he clearly did not see jail as a punishment.  He saw it as a positive reinforcement.

I have made the comment in the past, but I really want to say this: Not all students think the same way, not all students have the same things that are punishing to them (that make their behavior stop) or positively reinforcing to them (that make their behavior happen more).

Now we will move into the educational aspect of this topic.  I saw, during my student teaching placement, the behavior of students being suspended for skipping school.  Let's think about this, student skips school for the reason that they probably don't want to go to school.  The school, as a "punishment" to the student suspends that student.  What occurs when you suspend a student?  The student doesn't have to go to school.  So, by skipping school, we are giving them more days to skip school (aka suspension).

Is this behavior on our part of suspending students who skip school really punishing the behavior?  Or are we reinforcing the behavior of skipping by suspending a student?

Here is what I propose, let's figure out a proper consequence, one that promotes a good behavior that does the same function.  Instead of suspending students for skipping, let's give them a Friday off for good behavior if they come to school for two weeks in a row.

I feel like that may be met with consternated "No, that's not right.  That's not fair to other students."  I agree that it isn't fair to other students with the typical definition of fair, which is equal to the definition of equal.  Our society has given the name fair a definition of, roughly, "All students get the same thing."  Fairness, in reality, is equity, every student and person gets what they need, not what everyone else gets.

One of my professors from college, when anyone would bring up that it didn't seem fair would bring up an excellent point.  "I wear glasses, is that unfair?  Because you don't wear glasses."  To which the college student would usually respond, "Well, no, because you need them."  "Exactly, fairness is about need, not about equality."

Ponderous Ramblings

So, until now, my blog has been called future special ed teacher.  Now, I have graduated from college and have submitted my paperwork for getting my teaching license.  I don't really know what to do, should I change the title of the blog or leave it the same?  Technically, I am not a special ed teacher yet because I 1) don't have a job and 2) don't have a license.  I think I'll leave it the same for a while.

So, I have had 3 interviews for jobs in the last 3 months and I don't have a job yet.  It's already June and I don't have a job.  I'm not entirely sure about this, but I am freaking out because I don't have a job yet.  I just wish that I knew where I would be having a job next year so I can best know the student population to know how to best help them.  But I don't have a job.  I can't stop myself from thinking: What if I don't get a job?

Michigan teacher claims she was fired for organizing Trayvon Martin fundraiser

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/detroit/michigan-teacher-claims-she-fired-organizing-trayvon-martin-144713504.html

I just want to say up front that I am not going to touch the issue of race in this story.  It is possible that it is the very cornerstone of everything relating to Trayvon Martin.  No, I want to talk about 21st century learning.  One of the 21st century skills that we, as teachers, want from our students is for them to be active citizens of America.  This teacher found something that her students connected to, which was this story about Trayvon Martin, and she used it to teach English and how to write as well as how to act upon your thoughts and be active citizens.

However, our society is still plagued by the "either/or" philosophy.  The school told her that she is being paid to teach, not to be an activist.  She wasn't the one who was being the activist, she was cultivating it in her students.  I am confused because all of the older generations criticize our generation as the epitome of laziness and political apathy.  When we find something that we feel passionate about, whether that be the take back wallstreet movement or this Trayvon Martin movement, we are criticized again and told "You are just being stupid" or "go find a job" or "the hoodie that Trayvon Martin was wearing was as much a part of his death as George Zimmerman was."

Studies have been done about engaging curriculum and they have shown that if you engage your students in a lesson with something that they are passionate about, they learn better.  For instance, if you have a student who hates math and love motorcycles and teach him about math using motorcycles (i.e. the length of the parts of a motorcycle, how the motorcycle connects here and there and those are called degrees and how the opposite side of that degree is the same.), they are going to learn so much more than if you just put up an overhead projector and said "This is an angle, this is an angle, they are on opposite sides, they are equiangular, meaning they have the same angle."

This teacher used something that they were passionate about and utilized it, and she was fired for it.  Our schools have become ghosts, we don't want to push our agenda, but we want to make active citizens.  You can't have both is what the theory is, you can't teach about being an active citizen and remain neutral about party lines.  But that is not true, we need to look at it in this way "There is not one thing in this world that we do not have an opinion about.  Some math teachers might view math as the most useless thing in the world, but they teach it.  Just because we have viewpoints that are not neutral, we should negate the fact that it is imperative to teach how to be an active citizen."  My point of that is to say that if we only teach things where we don't have an opinion, students will not as much as they could if we do have opinions.

Then there is the issue that being an active citizen is expected of our generation, and yet, schools are afraid to touch on that subject because they might be criticized for pushing their agenda.  Therefore, we have an achievement gap, our students are not learning how to be active citizens of our society.  You can argue that it is just inherent, either you have it or you don't.  But there are skills in being an active citizen that need to be taught.  Students with disabilities struggle with learning (and may never learn) the hidden curriculum of our society.  That hidden curriculum are things like "how to speak in front of people, how to form your thoughts, how to think about the opposite viewpoint to your opinions."  If students don't learn these things, we, as educators, are not helping them build their castles on solid ground.  Our job is to help them learn that if they make a castle in the sand, nature destroys it slowly.

Chicken or the Egg

The age-old question of "which came first, the chicken or the egg" can easily be asked in the education world.  Here is the Chicken and Egg in the education world, "which came first, a learning disability that causes behavior or a behavior that causes learning difficulty?"

I have taught some awesome students in my school, and the behaviors usually come from a complex concept that they scream "I can't do this!" or "I don't understand this!"  It has led me to wonder why learning disabilities and emotional/behavioral disorders cannot both be diagnosed in a student.  Did you know that?  A person can not be labeled with both an SLD and an EBD according to the federal law, they are mutually exclusive.

Apparently, not understanding something that everyone around you understands doesn't cause any behaviors or emotional problems.  If you don't understand why 1+1=2, I think that is going to cause some possible behaviors or emotional problems such as self-esteem and depression problems.  When I struggled with math through all of my education, I really did want to take the chair or table that I was working at and throw it across the room.  Here is the difference, though, I never did that, I wanted to, but I didn't.  This brings up the question: "Well, why do some students throw chairs or flip desks while others don't?"  The answer to that is personality, it depends on if the person's personality is impulsive or not.  If a person is impulsive, they are more likely to throw the chair and tip the desk because they are frustated.

So which came first, learning disorder or behavior problems?  Another rhetorical question to which I do not have a perfect answer, just an opinion.  Both happened first, the learning disability affects the behavior, the behavior affects the learning.  Or, the behavior affects the learning and then the learning disability affects the behavior.  They work with each other to create behavior problems.

Who do you Serve First?

With all of this testing that is required in the united states because of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), questions arise about who should we serve first.  Should we serve the students who are close to passing the tests or do we serve the students who are so far below that they need our help now.  Which ones should we do first?

This is kind of a rhetorical question, one that I do not have an answer to.  I have my thoughts, which is we need to serve both.  Being a future special education teacher, I am biased towards wanting to help those who are so far below that it will take a lot to help them pass.  I like the challenge and it is worth it, because while they may not pass the test, you will be able to see how much progress the students make.  Gains will always be made, however, the question is: who should determine whether the gains are big enough?

I just don't understand why we have to choose between helping those who need our help and helping those who need our help desperately (desperately creates a sense of pity, so I wish I could think of another word for this, but can't right now).  It creates yet another dichotomy, and how do we decide?  Many teachers decide based on which ones they want to work with more.  Those students with problem behaviors are more likely (I have no proof of this, recognize that) to be in that group of needing help desperately.  Many teachers view problem behaviors as difficult, so many teachers are more likely to work with those who don't need the help as much.

A few weeks ago, a teacher sent a student to me to teach a student how to put on his snow pants.  That was borderline ridiculous, if not completely over the line of ridiculousness.  Why can't the general education teachers teach the student themselves while they are on prep?  I don't even end up getting a prep because general education teachers send our students to us and we have to deal with them.

Change

I am not even going to start this blog off by saying that it has been a long time since I last posted (oh, crap! I just did say that by saying that I was not going to say it.  CRAP!).  I haven't been kicked out yet from Lincoln and I don't think I will be kicked out.

Well, I want to discuss how hard change is.  I have already mentioned many times that change is hard.  But I want to talk more about a change that is detrimental to life.  A change in our thoughts.  I went into my student teaching experience expecting that what I had would work.  What I had was a summer full of people with disabilities and how to deal with them.  Call me stupid (because I know I am), but I had this philosophy.

I knew one thing, though.  I knew that I knew nothing.  The more you learn in education, the more you learn that you don't know a single thing.

But viewpoints change in life, whether we want them to or not.  I didn't expect/want my teaching philosophy to change, but change it has throughout everything that I have done.  Day 1 was only observation, day 2 started it up.  By day 3, I was doing everything, teaching every lesson.  My life has changed because of this in the most amazing way.  My teaching philosophy looks almost identical to what it was before.  With the change of this: We cannot always be the student's friend or buddy.  We need to be what they need us to be.  If that means being a teacher, then be a teacher.  If that means being a should to cry on, then be that shoulder.  I need to use a holistic approach to teaching, and I hope you will as well.