Middle School is Different

This was something I wrote for one of the classes in my Education masters program, for a class dealing with middle school education. It was a response to an article on I-Searches, a form of paper in which students consistently analyze their search process, and there were references to a book on the middle school movement.

I was unaware of the history of the Middle School as something independent from elementary school and high school. It provides more understanding on policies that affect students and teachers. For example, I’m going for a 7-12 certification which fits the Junior High model but not the 6-8 Middle School model that’s been the norm since before I was born. It might be difficult to find a better example of bureaucratic sclerosis.

From my own experiences, I can certainly agree with Lounsbury’s conclusion that middle schools aren’t the best way to teach students in an important age group. I was already aware of the implications of this particular cognitive stage of the students, although I hadn’t considered the moral aspects of reaching students at this particular point in their development.

Lounsbury’s piece suggests the flaws in the standard practice, but doesn’t provide an alternative, aside from the implication that it’s better when schools are free to experiment. This raises a lot of questions, as there are incentives for a degree of homogeneity. Students and teachers move, and high schools often consist of students from multiple middle schools, so some standards may be necessary so that high school freshmen would have similar levels of background knowledge.

The course text provides more concrete solutions. The emphasis on exploration is welcome, since this is a time when students learn how to do independent research. I think it would be excellent to have this as an important part of the process. Part of the book might be a response to other attitudes so prevalent that they don’t require any kind of explanation or justification in a document meant for educators, but flexibility isn’t the only priority. There are some things all students should learn, suggesting a time and place for assessments.

I remember doing I-searches in Middle School, although some of the specifics differed. I don’t know if my I-searches were split into the four sections mentioned in the piece. The thing I notice immediately is that it serves many purposes. It allows students a chance to explore topics that are of interest to them, but also helps prepare them for the essays they’ll need to write in High School, and maybe college.

Grading is a little bit different for these, but in a sensible way. I thought of describing it as less rigorous, since students get credit for research, even if there are no significant results. But it’s not entirely accurate to say that it’s easier, since the students still have to do a fair amount of writing and explaining. Whereas high school papers typically require students finding something about their subject, the purpose here is to teach students how to research, so allowing them an opportunity to explain why they weren’t able to learn specific information is still useful. It prepares them for high school with slightly less pressure to get results. Frustrations and setbacks can be educational, and it’s a good way to teach students that.

There are many variations of the I-chart, which makes it a versatile tool for Middle School Literacy teachers. I’m sure I’d do quite a few of these as teacher. If I had to search information about Middle School level teaching for an I-Search, it would be the pros and cons of teaching as a moral enterprise, and how to handle the so-called grey areas.

Oops

This was the panel from Amazing Spider-Man #121.

And this is the one I’m used to.

In the original comic, the script called for the Washington Bridge, but artist Gil Kane drew the Brooklyn Bridge. When the text was corrected, the joke had to be removed, which might have been for the best given the nasty thing that happens a few pages later.

George Eliot on slang

Every now and then, I come across an argument in a centuries old book that still feels fresha and relevant.

From George Eliot’s Middlemarch.

“Are you beginning to dislike slang, then?” said Rosamond, with mild gravity.

“Only the wrong sort. All choice of words is slang. It marks a class.”

“There is correct English: that is not slang.”

“I beg your pardon: correct English is the slang of prigs who write history and essays. And the strongest slang of all is the slang of poets.”

“You will say anything, Fred, to gain your point.”

“Well, tell me whether it is slang or poetry to call an ox a leg-plaiter.”

“Of course you can call it poetry if you like.”

“Aha, Miss Rosy, you don’t know Homer from slang. I shall invent a new game; I shall write bits of slang and poetry on slips, and give them to you to separate.”

“Dear me, how amusing it is to hear young people talk!” said Mrs. Vincy, with cheerful admiration.

Technically, the scene was excerpted in Michael Schmidt’s The Novel: A Biography.

Movies Watched In 2017 Part 2

Continuing my list…

I’m listing some attributes of films for my own benefit. I’m curious how many movies I’ll end up seeing this year in a specific genre or dealing with a particular subject matter. New movie just means a film I haven’t seen before. For the last month or so, I’ve focused exclusively on those.

Movie #26/ New Movie #24/ 1930s Movie #3/ Science Fiction Movie #5/ Movie About Politics #6/ Criterion Edition #6: Things To Come
This is a weird film, a vision of the future circa 1935. It’s often, preachy and didactic, although quite interesting in the hints of the flaws of the coming utopia (towards the end, the mob attacking the scientist’s house has a good point). The special effects are fascinating, and the set designs are incredible.
7/10

Movie #27/ New Movie #25/ Russian Movie #1/ Criterion Edition #7 1970s Movie #5/ Science Fiction Movie #6: Solaris
This was a strange mix of genre and director, with an arthouse Russian depicting weirdness on board a space station. The central mystery leads to some interesting questions, as scientists communicate with a strange species. The visuals are stunning and it takes some interesting turns.
9/10

Movie #28/ New Movie #26/ Silent Movie Era #3/ Criterion Edition #8/ German Film #1: Pandora’s Box
This was a silent film about a fallen woman that takes some weird turns, especially with the ending, and a surprisingly sympathetic take on Jack the Ripper. The most appealing part of the film is the magnetic lead performance of Louise Brooks.
9/10

Movie #29/ New Movie #27/ 2010s Movie #6/ Criterion Edition #9/ German Film #2: Phoenix
Essentially a Holocaust noir, as a concentration camp survivor tries to figure out if her husband sold her out to German officials, after having had just enough plastic surgery for her husband to think she looks enough like his dead wife to help get his hands on her inheritance. The ending is stunning.
8/10

Movie #30/ New Movie #28/ Japanese Movie #2/ Criterion Edition #10/ 1970s Movie #6/ Comic Book Movie #2: Lone Wolf and Cub: Baby Cart at the River Styx
The narrative’s a bit episodic and unfocused, although that’s the norm for the series. It’s more of an excuse for compelling set pieces, some of them straight out of the manga. The highlight is an encounter on a burning ship. It does raise some interesting moral questions, including whether the lead is on the right side. The film acknowledges that he could very easily be the antagonist, showing the perspectives of his various enemies.
8/10

Movie #31/ New Movie #29/ 1960s Movie #3: Hud
This is the second film I’ve seen this year in which Melvyn Douglas won an Oscar for playing a dying patriarch. It’s an interesting take on messed up family dynamics, as a kid comes to realize that his uncle is a bit of a douchebag. The uncle’s played by Paul Newman in the 60s, so the audience liked him a lot more than they should have. Patricia O’Neal gave a tremendous performance as the harried housekeeper.
9/10

Movie #32/ New Movie #30/ 2010s Movie #7/ Science Fiction Movie #7/ Comic Book Movie #3: Logan
It’s arguably the best of the X-Men films, and I’ve liked most of them. It’s remarkable for how dark the fates of the characters are, but then there’s a new take on X-23. I heard an argument on a podcast that the focus on Logan and Professor X stripped the X-Men  films to their essence for a story about loss, regret and making a difference. This is likely the most satisfying finale to a cinematic superhero saga.
9/10

Movie #33/ New Movie #31/ 2010s Movie #8/ Black Cinema #2: Moonlight
Yeah, this film deserved to win Best Picture, and I quite liked La La Land. Mahersala Ali was tremendous as a conflicted drug dealer with a potential motive for helping out a kid. He disappears, but there is a very clever way of making sure his presence is felt in the other chapters. The format of looking at three episodes in Chiron’s life works really well. Naomi Harris is quite good as the deeply flawed mom, the one character seen in all three portions, who has several compelling transformations. The score is great, and the film has a tremendous sense of color. The central love story is handled very delicately.
10/10

Movie #34/ New Movie #32/ 2010s Movie #9: Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates
It’s not terrible, but it may be the worst movie I’ve seen so far this year. It’s a derivative comedy about hedonistic twenty-somethings and weddings, with some decent gags and a winning performance by Audrey Plaza.
6/10

Movie #35/ New Movie #33/ 1930s Movie #4: Baby Face
This pre-Code shortish film had some similarities to Pandora’s Box, and material that seems really out of place for early Hollywood (after the death of her father/ pimp, a young woman sleeps her way to the top). It’s entertaining, and borderline corrupt.
7/10

Movie #36/ New Movie #34/ 1960s Movie #4/ Criterion Edition #11/ Theatrical Adaptation #3: The Chimes at Midnight
Orson Welles, the greatest actor-director, depicts one of Shakespeare’s greatest characters. It had to be good, and it is, although the merging of multiple plays into one story results in some moments that are quite unfocused. It’s all worth it for Welles as the self-indulgent but always compelling Falstaff.
8/10

Movie #37/ New Movie #35/ 1970s Movie #7: The Great Waldo Pepper
I was interested in this ever since I read about it in William Goldman’s Adventures in the Screen Trade. The story of a barnbusting pilot in the days before regulation suffers a bit from abrupt tonal shifts. Characters die without the weirdness being sufficiently acknowledged. With Robert Redford as the lead, you see why Waldo Pepper gets away with so much.
7/10

Movie #38/ New Movie #36/ 1980s Movie #3: Arthur
An odd romance about a middle aged alcoholic boor pissed off about how he has to get married. In the inevitable scene where he breaks off his engagement, I appreciate the ways they keep the audience on his side. John Gieguld might have been the best version of a particular type (the droll butler who loves his patron, but wishes he would grow the hell up) in film.
8/10

Movie #39/ New Movie #37/ 2000s Movie #2/ Movie About Politics #7: Recount
I’ve been slacking when it comes to movies from the early 2000s; not sure why. It may be that at this point, I’ve seen most of the highlights of that particular decade, so there’s not as much to catch up on. I had some temporary subscriptions to HBO Now and Filmstruck, which may also be biased towards earlier movies (with Filmstruck’s Criterion collection) and the last few years (with HBO).

This was a great ensemble piece about the behind the scenes fighting during the 2000 Florida recount. For the most part, it was fair to the two sides, mixing the legal strategy and consequences, with some additional chaos (especially with Laura Dern’s Katherine Harris.)
8/10

Movie #40/ New Movie #38/ 1960s Movie #5/ Science Fiction Movie #8: These are the Damned
The film has quite a few balancing acts, starting out as a teen gang story in which a young woman decides to leave her brother’s group with the help of an older guy she helped them mug. There’s a slow build to the inevitable scene where they are forced into a secret army experiment, encountering weird children who still act like kids but pose a threat to the public. This raises some questions that are tough to resolve. It’s essential viewing for Kubrick fans due to the influence on A Clockwork Orange and Dr. Strangelove.
9/10

Movie #41/ New Movie #39/ 1960s Movie #6: Never Take Candy From a Stranger
This is not what I expected to be the subject matter of a 1960s film. The first two-thirds feature a family’s efforts to sue a powerful local for sexually harassing their daughter, and it makes for a compelling legal drama. There’s a mismatch with the final act, in which an old pervert is transformed into something else.
8/10

Movie #42/ New Movie #40/ 1980s Movie #3: Angel Heart
This is a weird horror-noir. It has a fantastic score, and sense of location, especially as the lead’s journey takes him to New Orleans in 1955. But it goes into some messed up territory.
8/10

Movie #43/ New Movie #41/ 2000s Movie #3/ Criterion Edition #12: In the Mood For Love
Interesting beautifully shot film with a slightly disorienting narrative as jilted spouses struggle with their own feelings, and their need to understand why they were cheated on, as well as the morality of what they’re doing by essentially falling into an emotional affair they don’t quite want to acknowledge.
9/10

Movie #44/ New Movie #42/ 1970s Movie #8/ Black Cinema #3: Killer of Sheep
This was mentioned in a “Best of” book I was given as a present years ago (The National Society of Film Critics’ 100 Essential Films where it had a writeup by the now disgraced Armond White) so I’ve been aware of it for a while without seeing it. It’s a strange but compelling film, a literal MFA thesis which adopts the Italian Neorealism style for the Watts neighborhood of California in the 1970s, showing vignettes in the life of a family struggling to find dignity in the ghetto. The soundtrack (which kept the film from finding wider release) is excellent.
9/10

Howard Gardner and Education Literature

Once again, this part of something I wrote when going for my Masters. This was on Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences.

There can be two very different responses to older articles on education. Sometimes a piece that seems somewhat recent can be hopelessly outdated, especially when it comes to the implementation of technology. Other times something written decades ago is very pertinent to the current environment. That’s certainly been the case in this class, where I sometimes read about a problem from years ago, and wonder why it hasn’t been fixed yet, when someone has already described it so well.

Given my interest in culture, Howard Gardner’s “Multiple Intelligences: Implications for Art and Creativity” was going to appeal to me. He raised a point on the shortcomings of something that only measures old knowledge, and suggested “fashioning a product” (17) as an alternative, something that can give more students a chance to shine.

Gardner noted how some of the most skilled human beings ever alive, from Gandhi to Virginia Woolf, had immensely different talents. Gardner also discussed unusual individuals like idiot savants. (17) This gets to a question for education policy. Is the aim of the education system to result in more humans like Picasso or Freud, when the vast majority will never have that level of influence? Or is it to help the majority? It’s also worth noting that some of the intelligences aren’t necessarily marketable, and some talents may be redundant, so there may not be an advantage to every school in the United States producing one Sigmund Freud each year. The counterargument is that we should aim for a society in which everyone is able to reach their full potential, so that there will be hundreds of Gandhis advocating for change, and that every subculture will have a Virginia Woolf to write about their experiences and understanding of the world.

Garnder’s assumption that “not all people have the same mind (22)” has major implications for teaching and assessment. It’s horrifying when he described “a child who at the age of six is already classified as a scholastic loser.” (24) His conclusion wasn’t that assessments were bad, but that they were performed was ineffective. He felt that process was important than results, hence the article he wrote with Rieneke Zessoules, “Authentic Assessment: Beyond the Buzzword and Into the Classroom.” The authors complained of days when “each American child takes as many as three such standardized tests every school year (48)” and I’m sure many teachers long for the days when it was that rare. These experts saw the problem decades ago, and I saw the effect at a time when students received three examinations in a three week period.

Gardner and Zessoules described efforts of teachers to have their students create new products, which is the most cognitively difficult step on Bloom’s taxonomy, and arguably the most effective way to learn something. However, a problem is that it’s difficult to assess by traditional standardized means. The English teacher Jerry Halpern described his struggle determining why students make particular changes in drafts of their stories (67) even though there must be a clear reason as far as the student is concerned, and the process demonstrates that the children possess a deeper understand than they previously had. The article cites the “hills and valleys of (the) development of a young writer” (64) to highlight another facet. Maturation can be bumpy, but students are often expected to progress in a clear path.

Another task that is effective is getting students to make reflections, which ties to metacogniton and self-regulation, two of the most important attributes for a learner, and two things that are difficult to measure on a test. Gardner and Zessoules prefer process-folios over measuring what kids know. A disadvantage is that the latter allows the initially more advanced students to coast, as they have less incentives to grow, or to push themselves.

Eleanor Duckworth’s “The Having of Wonderful Ideas” provided strong insights into how children learn. Some of the wonderful ideas would be the types of things adults take for granted, and that can be dismissed if we expect children to be like little adults who just need to be told the things that adults already know. It is often difficult for many of us to appreciate how children come to understand the world in the way we do, which requires them figuring out the things we’ve already figured out.

The piece ends with the observation that students “will some day happen upon wonderful ideas that no one else has ever happened upon before.” (14) This expectation that students will come up with something new seems contrary to getting adults to appreciate what’s going on in the mind of a child. I wonder if it’s reasonable to expect all students to be truly creative, although I don’t recall any of the students I co-taught not being inventive in some way, so it may come down to a difference in definitions and frames of reference.

Best Spider-Man Stories By Decade

This was something I did for a message board a while back. The challenge was to list the best Spider-Man stories by decade. It’s obviously very subjective, although it was a useful exercise in considering what made the character tic, and in getting a variety of approaches to the character.

1960s…
1. The Master Planner Saga- Amazing Spider-Man #31-33
2. Spider-Man- Amazing Fantasy #15
3. Disaster- Amazing Spider-Man #53-59
4. Spider-Man No More!- Amazing Spider-Man #50-52
5. Madness Is All In The Mind- Amazing Spider-Man #24
6. Spider-Man and the Green Goblin-Both Unmasked- Amazing Spider-Man #39-40
7. Horns of the Rhino- Amazing Spider-Man #41-43
8. The End of Spider-Man- Amazing Spider-Man #17-19
9. The Sinister Six- Amazing Spider-Man Annual #1
10 (Tie). Bring Back My Goblin To Me (Amazing Spider-Man #26-27) and The Goblin Lives! (Spectacular Spider-Man Magazine #2)

The 60s marked the one decade dominated by one writer, Spider-Man co-creator Stan Lee. I have heard arguments for counting the Lee/ Ditko collaborations as a separate writer due to Ditko’s contributions to the plots, which would give the decade a 50/50 split.

1970s…
1. The Night Gwen Stacy Died (Amazing Spider-Man #121-122)
2. Return of the Burglar (Amazing Spider-Man #193-200)
3. Enter…Morbius (Amazing Spider-Man #100-102)
4. The Punisher (Amazing Spider-Man #129)
5. The Longest Hundred Yards (Amazing Spider-Man #153)
6. Spider-Man…Murderer (Amazing Spider-Man #89-90)
7. A Matter of Love…and Death (Marvel Team-Up #59-60)
8. And Then Came Electro (Amazing Spider-Man #82)
9. The Green Goblin Lives Again! (Amazing Spider-Man #136-137)
10. At Kraven’s Command (Marvel Team-Up #67)

In contrast to other decades, it took me a long time to come up with ten worthy stories for the 70s, although it was interesting how much of what we’d think of as 1960s or 1980s Spider-Man came from these years, with the end of Stan Lee’s Spider-Man, and Chris Claremont/ John Byrne’s Marvel Team-Up.

1980s…
1. The Kid Who Collects Spider-Man (Amazing Spider-Man #248)
2. Nothing Can Stop the Juggernaut (Amazing Spider-Man #229-230)
3. Kraven’s Last Hunt
4. Spider-Man VS Wolverine
5. The Death of Jean Dewolfe (Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #107-110)
6. The Hobgoblin Saga (Amazing Spider-Man #238-239, 244-245, 247-251)
7. Venom (Amazing Spider-Man #300)
8. The Owl-Octopus War (Peter Parker the Spectacular Spider-Man #72-79)
9. The Commuter (Amazing Spider-Man #267)
10. Hyde…In Plain Sight (Amazing Spider-Man #231-232)

Honorable mentions are too many to name. Tom Defalco would likely have made the top ten in any other decade with the Alien Costume saga, and the return of Crusher Hogan.

1990s…
1. Best Enemies (Spectacular Spider-Man #178-200)
2. The Gift (Amazing Spider-Man #400)
3. Amazing Fantasy #16-18
4. Arachnomorphosis (What If? #89)
5. Torment (Spider-Man #1-5)
6. Spidey Battles Hawkeye the Marksman (Untold Tales of Spider-Man #17)
7. Revelations Part 4 (Spider-Man #75)
8. Spider-Man/ Spider-Man 2099
10. Ye Gods (Spider-Man 2099 #17)

 

Even compared to the 70s, it was tough to come up with enough good stories for this decade. Though I guess I could have split the Harry Osborn saga into multiple stories. This was probably the decade with my most unconventional choices (Todd McFarlane’s writing debut, and a really obscure dark What If? issue in the top five.)

2000s….
1. Learning Curve (Ultimate Spider-Man #8-13)
2. Down Among the Dead Men (Marvel Knights Spider-Man #1-12)
3. One Small Break (Peter Parker Spider-Man #30-32)
4. Spider-Man Blue
5. Unscheduled Stop (Amazing Spider-Man #578-579)
6. Spider-Man/ Human Torch: I’m With Stupid
7. Coming Home (Amazing Spider-Man Volume 2 #30-35, 37, 38)
8. Field of Dream (Peter Parker Spider-Man #27-28)
9. The Ultimate Clone Saga (Ultimate Spider-Man #97-105)
10. Behind the Mustache (Tangled Web #20)

This ended up being another really good decade for the Spider-Man comics.

2010s….
1. Superior Spider-Man #1-10
2. Matters of Life & Death (Amazing Spider-Man #655-656)
3. Shed (Amazing Spider-Man #630-633))
4. Gauntlet: The Rhino (Amazing Spider-Man #617, 625)
5. Spider Island (Amazing Spider-Man #666-673/ Venom #6-9)
6. Superior Foes of Spider-Man Volume 1
7. Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows #1-5
8. Death of Spider-Man (Ultimate Spider-Man #156-160)
9. Dying Wish (Amazing Spider-Man #698-700)
10. Spider-Gwen (Edge of Spider-Verse #2)

I’ve decided to chunk the first ten issues of Superior Spider-Man as one story since there is a beginning, middle and end (even if it functions well as part of a larger story.) The decade’s not over yet, but this marks a respectable showing (although for this decade, I’ve read almost every comic, while it’s possible that there are some obscure 1970s and 1990s comics that are quite good, but I’ve never managed to read.)

 

Favorite Movies For Every Year

A friend of mine did something like this online, and I thought it was an interesting idea: a selection of favorite movies for every year. The gimmick my friend did was to do it for every year you’ve been alive, but I’m clearly too insane for that.

I’m starting with 1931, because I wasn’t familiar enough with the notable 1930 films. ’31 had City Lights, the Fredrich March Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and the Universal Horrors classics Dracula and Frankenstein, in addition to the winner, so I felt comfortable that I had seen enough to make an intelligent selection, and that this was the case for every subsequent year.

1931-M

1932-Freaks

1933-Duck Soup

1934-It Happened One Night

1935-Bride of Frankenstein

1936-Modern Times

1937-Snow White and the Seven Dwarves

1938-The Adventures of Robin Hood

1939-Gone With the Wind

1940-Pinccochio

1941-Citizen Kane

1942-Casablanca

1943-The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

1944-Double Indemnity

1945-Brief Encounter (this is not a year in film that I’m very familiar with, so there may be other movies out there that I’ll enjoy more)

1946-It’s a Wonderful Life

1947-Black Narcissus

1948-Treasure of the Sierra Madre

1949-The Third Man

1950-All About Eve

1951-The African Queen

1952-High Noon

1953-Tokyo Story

1954-Rear Window (very good year)

1955-Rififi

1956-The Searchers

1957-The Seventh Seal

1958- Vertigo

1959- North by Northwest

1960-Psycho

1961- Yojimbo

1962- Lawrence of Arabia

1963-The Great Escape

1964- Dr. Strangelove

1965- Doctor Zhigavo

1966- The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

1967- Bonnie and Clyde

1968- 2001: A Space Odyssey

1969- Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid

1970- Patton

1971-A Clockwork Orange

1972- The Godfather

1973- The Exorcist

1974- The Godfather Part 2

1975- Jaws

1976- Taxi Driver (Very good year)

1977- Star Wars

1978- Days of Heaven

1979- Apocalypse Now

1980-The Empire Strikes Back (damn good year)

1981-An American Werewolf in London

1982- ET (damn good year)

1983- Terms of Endearment (there were some notable films I hadn’t seen from that year)

1984- Once Upon a time in America (technically, the version I liked best came out later)

1985- Back to the Future (there were some notable films I hadn’t seen from that year)

1986- Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

1987- The Princess Bride

1988- Grave of the Fireflies

1989-Henry V

1990- Goodfellas

1991- Silence of the Lambs

1992- Unforgiven

1993-Schindler’s List

1994- Forrest Gump (not a knock on Pulp Fiction or The Shawshank Redemption, which would dominate in many other years)

1995- Toy Story

1996- Trainspotting

1997- Wag the Dog

1998- Saving Private Ryan

1999- South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut

2000- Requiem for a Dream

2001- Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring

2002-City of God

2003- Lord of the Rings: Return of the King

2004- Kill Bill Volume 2

2005- Munich

2006- The Lives of Others

2007- There Will Be Blood

2008- The Dark Knight

2009- Up

2010-The Social Network

2011- Hugo

2012- Zero Dark Thirty

2013- The Wolf of Wall Street

2014- The Grand Budapest Hotel

2015- Mad Max: Fury Road

2016- Moonlight

It was an interesting exercise. There is an element of randomness as there are some years where I’ve seen quite a few notable films. For example, 1954 had On the Waterfront, The Seven Samurai, La Strada, Sancho the Bailiff, and the beginning of the Samurai trilogy. Other years represent major blind spots for me. I went with Brief Encounter for 1945, but I hadn’t seen a few that I’ve heard good things about (Children of Paradise, Mildred Pierce, Blithe Spirit, They Were Expendable, Rome Open City.) From 1985, I haven’t seen The Color Purple (Ebert’s #1 film of the year), Out of Africa (the Best Picture winner), The Goonies, Witness or Curse of the Spider-Woman, so Back to the Future‘s reign may be brief.

I often find myself relying on the memory of something I’ve seen once years ago, so some of the choices are subject to change. For 1988, I made a snap judgement that Grave of the Fireflies was better than The Vanishing, a very different film that’s on the same level in terms of artistic merit. Coming up with the list does allows for a greater appreciation for a few films. If I compare Ferris Beuller’s Day Off to other major and good films from 1986 (Platoon, Blue Velvet, The Fly, Aliens) and it comes out ahead, it’s worth acknowledging its staying power. The South Park movie also shines with this kind of spotlight. It’s not a slight on American Beauty, Fight Club, The Matrix, The Sixth Sense, The Green Mile, Being John Malkovich, Toy Story 2, The Insider, The Iron Giant, The Talented Mr. Ripley, Office Space, Galaxy Quest or Bowfinger. I just liked the South Park film with the penis pun in the title better. Though, if I ever finish Magnolia I might change my mind on what the best film of that year was.

Novice Teachers

This was part of a piece I wrote for a class when I was going for my Education Masters. It was in response to a scholarly article on the role of empathy in education.

The first thought I had reading Wender’s piece (33) was that I’m not looking forward to the inevitable situation of teaching a kid teachers in the school don’t like. I did co-teach for a summer school, and the cooperating teacher knew the students, but the warnings I received were relatively mild. I had the sense that the teacher legitimately liked the students, which was a fortunate experience come to think of it.

Tying into my comments on observer bias in the last reflection, I am automatically skeptical of any anecdotal evidence meant to prove a point, so there is the question of selection bias in the story of students Wender had failed to help. (33) Maybe the stories she remembers aren’t that illustrative. I do admire her willingness to consider mistakes that were made, which has been rarity in writings about education policies.

Wender has a good point about the difference between empathy and pity/ approval. (34) I think I can be empathetic, although it may sometimes require a deeper understanding of a student’s situation, in order to appreciate their priorities. Her impromptu letters (36) are an interesting idea, although I don’t know if it’s practical enough to lose so much time in the curriculum. It’s the type of stuff that can add up. I’m intrigued by the idea of making empathy part of the teaching culture, although I do have some questions.  How does that work? How is it practical? And how would it be assessed (which might not be something anyone worried about excessive testing wants asked)?

Wender has another strong point on how students tend to have multiple literacies, and how schools have a tendency to ignore most of them. (35) The ELA Supervisor who rejected a student’s use of Spanish in a piece still meant for an English-speaking audience seemed to have more empathy for unqualified graders who wouldn’t know how to handle something like that than for the students, which shows a significant problem in the system.

She describes how beginning teachers tend to focus more on content than on students (36) although this does make sense. Educators who are just starting out tend to be less experienced, and tend to know their content area more than the nuances of how children learn. To fix this, it might not be enough for the standard education programs to change, since there will be some teachers who start out without significant education training. When I was in Teaching Fellows, they had everyone in the class co-teach a summer school after a six credit basic course, and another course that was essentially a book club for Dan Lemov’s Teach Like a Champion. I believe Teach For America has similar training, and a few private schools don’t require much of a background in education in order for a teacher to be employed. So even if education programs got better at teaching people how to teach, it might not be enough.

The consensus is that teachers get better as they spend more years at it. But in my year at this university, I haven’t seen anyone address the elephant in the room: What students should be made to work under novice teachers? Whose kids will be the guinea pigs? I guess there’s the claim that teachers need more preparation so that no one is a novice on their first day, although that seems very expensive for a profession with such high turnover.

Skepticism on Middle School Solutions

This was something I wrote for a class in my education masters program.

One of the most surprising things I read for any of the classes this year was the notion that Middle School is often less cognitively demanding then elementary school. (Kennedy-Lewis, 101) That seems like something that has to change, and would be a top priority of mine as a middle grades teacher. I’ve made the observation a few times that there are some policy problems that individual teachers are unable to change, but this seems to be one where one teacher can make a significant impact, even if working in the framework of strict curricula. It’s something new to keep in mind when making lesson plans in the future: Is the material sufficiently cognitively demanding? The article was written in 2013, and that section references material in 2012, so it should still be relevant. It’s an indication that there should be a healthy skepticism for business as usual in any school where I’d be lucky enough to be employed, if this remains a national problem.

I’m a big proponent of evidence based methods in teaching and elsewhere. The numbers for Positive Behavior Interventions and Support (Cramer and Bennet, 19) although in my attempt to summarize what exactly it means if 95% of students are helped in the first two tiers, I realized that there are additional questions. Students in the first tier are probably less likely to act out in class, so an understanding that 80% of students will respond to Tier One intervention might mislead a teacher who believes that this means 80% of situations will be resolved by Tier One intervention. In addition, distribution in schools is likely to be unequal. When reading about Special Education programs, I was reminded about statistics I had seen in another class about the low graduation numbers for African-American Special- Ed students in New York City, and arguments that it was a system with perverse incentives for administrators.

The article mentioned a problem with “one size fits all” solutions although there is an advantage (23) in perceived fairness when everyone is treated the same (IE- the same offense gets the same punishment.) There might be a perception of favoritism if students with disruptive home lives are less likely to be suspended. I could probably argue for hours about the implications of the articles with friends and family (it may very well end up happening anyway) although I still have more questions than answers. I don’t know if it’s realistic to get biased teachers to admit their own bigotry, (19) given how socially unacceptable blatant racism is. The backfire effect (the way people often double down on an issue when they learn they’re wrong about the facts) is also going to be a factor. I’m also curious about whether there’s an observer bias in interviews with persistently disciplined students.

The articles provided some food for thought in terms of what middle grades teacher I’d want to be. I certainly don’t want to be the type of teacher who says “Go and leave the classroom. I don’t care.” (Kennedy-Lewis, 104) While reading the papers, I made a note that “Man, advisory would have helped out here” as students dealt with their struggles adjusting from one kind of school to another. I remember having these kinds of problems as a student, and once crying in a school office because I didn’t know where to go for my next class, the first time I had lost my program card. I’ve probably complained about the administrators in my Intermediate School (officially not a Middle School or Junior High School) but they were relatively nice about that. It’s hard to imagine them responding otherwise, but I suppose that happens, and that has to be heartbreaking for a struggling student.

Skewed Results in Education

This was a reflection I wrote for one of my classes in my education Masters program. It was a response to a series of articles about new efforts at improving middle schools. One of those was an example of project-based learning, as students worked on a larger project in lieu of traditional classes. Another was a program in which teachers spent more time planning for the coming academic year.

I don’t know if Hill feels guilty about the “betrayal of traditional pedagogy.” He seemed more concerned about the response of parents and teachers, than about self-doubt. He was aware of the risk when deviating from the standards. This We Believe does provide reassurances for any educator devising an integrated program, so there are certainly good arguments for it. He shouldn’t feel guilty, because he’s making an effort at positive change. However, there are still legitimate concerns for educators to be cognizant of.

When reading articles in academic journals, anecdotes in larger education texts, or works of journalism dealing with new teaching strategies, we are much more likely to read about experiments that teachers take that end up being effective than the things they try that don’t work. A noble experiment that turns out being a disaster is less likely to be written about, even though there can be tremendous value in demonstrating to teachers the things that they shouldn’t try, and in determining why something was ineffective. A counterargument is that the floor is so low, especially in high needs schools, that an effort at change is unlikely to make things noticeably worse.

The Strive Prep model was demonstrably successful, and it has a few advantages. One aspect is that they go for low hanging fruit, especially with summer vacations and curriculum planning. The effects of “summer learning loss” have been known for some time, but other systems haven’t managed to solve it. It’s also well-known that teachers benefit from spending significant time planning curricula and working together.

The article discusses the advantages of the system being new, and there’s a lot to be said for that. When making major changes, as in adopting an year-round model or giving teachers four weeks to plan the academic year together, they don’t have to worry about bureaucratic sclerosis or systems (and employees) set in old and often outmoded ways. They’re able to put the needs of the students first.

What stands out about the methods that work in the three articles is that these are based on the needs of the individual students, rather than the set curriculum to one specific class. Asking kids to make a project about their heroes or the touring schedule for a hypothetical band allows them to use what they’ve learned in ways that are relevant to them. The hero project fosters community involvement, and helps students consider who their models for ideal behavior are. Sometimes, parents aren’t adequate role models, while community leaders, sports stars, singers and actors can have significant personal failings, leaving children without a strong example to follow. The project is one step towards providing that, helpful in Middle School where children are making key decisions about the types of people they’re becoming.

The Tour Across America project requires students to develop their understanding of research skills, math, public speaking, writing, art, and geography. Working together in small groups also prepares them for the professional world. It should work better with teachers working together, rather than a Language Arts teacher using his time with the students to reinforce material learned elsewhere. The Strive Prep model eliminates most of the transition time, with teachers being the ones to switch classrooms, which does provide an integrated curriculum with a significant advantage of block scheduling as the children are educated by specialists in the content area.