Wes' TFA Adventure

Wow how they prepare us

With all the griping during institute and round 0 Teach For America has prepared us well.

We had district meetings Monday and Tuesday. These meetings are for new teachers to the district many of which are lateral entry and recent school of education graduates. The point of these meetings is to introduce new teachers to lesson planing, the achievement gap, and the rigors of teaching. These mismatched slides are all many people get before entering the classroom. Which is shocking.

This is not to say CM's are experts on these subjects. And I am no expert on the academics of education. But being knowledgeable about how to push your students despite overwhelming poverty is critical. The idea of having the same BIG ambitious goal for ALL of your students regardless of circumstance was foreign to many of my workshop participants and they were a virgin to these concepts until last this Monday.

Assessments Daily? why? that's so much work? asks my co-science teacher at my school. Yes I will try to assess 60 students daily. It is my goal for my 120 students to be assessed 3-2 times a week (We have a bi-daily schedule). It is my goal to continually increase my effectiveness based on if they are achieving their goal. They will be tracked they will be aware of their progression to my class goal. Every day I will DOG them about how they can increase their effectiveness because I will DOG myself to increase my effectiveness.Why will I do this: because many live in poverty and this is there only shot to make it. My tracking is life saving.

No back to our orientation days. 2/3rds of the new teachers at our district meeting/orientation are Teach For America CMs. Our last day we created lesson plans in groups of 4. In my group there were 3 CM's and a non-CM. The three of us were quickly bouncing ideas off each other. We self nominated a group leader who conducted us. Our traditional teacher questioned us achieving to objectives in one lesson. She questioned the practicality of us sending home homework when we were teaching at a title I school. Finally she had no idea what we meant when we kept saying "how do we assess them", "how does this work into a class goal" "wait we need to go back and backwards plan from the state standards and end of year standard test".

Teach For America should be proud. We were in our rooms in our professional dress. Hunkered into groups getting stuff done. I think our training has served us well

All done with institute- ps: it was hell

Institute was a life changing experience. It was pure hell. I do not mean that in a harsh way. All day every day I was being pushed beyond my comfort zone. There was little sleep, little rest, and seldom breaks between one major challenge to the next. There was a constant bombardment of work. I missed my family dearly. I felt like I did not have any control over my life. I felt confined and micromanaged beyond belief. I hated institute.

Did I survive? Yes. It was a positive to get through the expedience. Never before did it feel like so many people would become intimate parts of my life in the absence of family. Looking back its kind of odd the relationships I built at institute. Beecher feels sometimes uncomfortable at my stories of how I bonded with my other corps members.

My days were long. In many ways I feel like my institute experience was more challenging than most. I taught 3rd grade where there was a lot of planning involved. I was only in a 2 person co-lab while most of my peers were in 3-4 person co-labs. I was broke off my ass and couldn't stop worrying about money while away from home. Our school had the earliest bus departure time 5:30 am which meant waking up at 4:30 in order to get dressed, breakfast, and lunch. I was so overwhelmed with work and our schedule most nights I never went to bed until 1. Some nights I NEVER went to bed staying up 36-48 hours teaching, lesson planning, going to sessions, and tracking data. My relationship with Beecher was on the rocks. 

This in turn led to my depression, my inability to in the first weeks get my work done on time, which then led to me being put on an improvement plan which was mainly more meetings, more deadlines, and more check ins rather than formal support. I hated institute until the very last day.

The point of this blog is honesty. Institute sucked. But in the end I made it through. I met lots of great friends. My time when not working my ass off was genuinely fun. I made amazing long lasting connections with so many people. Institute was almost a social awakening to which I am thankful. Finally it gave me added confidence in myself and no longer am I scared of the classroom because I know I can do the work and I know that I can still do this work even on 2-3 hours of sleep, under the stresses of being broke, being near separation with my partner etc. Oh and Im forgetting the best part ever: My kids. Who for the most part were the least of my worries and the source of my joy (well when I properly planned a lesson correctly:)

And for you all reading this thinking they are going to plan better than this when they get in: good luck. Its harder than it looks few manage to do it :)

Now its onward to round zero. I'm still without a placement checking my email every 5 min. but thats for another post

Induction fun

Yesterday was the conclusion of the Charlotte Corps Induction. Over the past four days we covered everything from Teach For America's mission, to ways to connect with our student's and communities. Most importantly we covered the logistical task of actually being an employee of our local school district.

The experience was overwhelmingly positive. Since induction was in my hometown I opted to stay at home. This had it pro's and cons.It was difficult to get there in the morning and to head home in order to get changed for events. It was much back and forth in rush hour traffic etc. However it was great to be able to stay home and bond with my daughter before I am to leave for five weeks.

Speaking of bonding I felt I have really created a corps family over the past week. Before I felt like I was getting a job and going to be simply a corps member. Now I feel as if I have an extended community of people who share the same goals. I am part of a diverse movement. In the past it has been my focus on that "traditional corps member". One of the most valuable lessons taken has been the fact that there is no traditional corps member. While yes many come from upper income backgrounds, have many resources, are single, and have no dependents, some digging and you will find hundreds of unique individuals...

To conclude Im looking forward to institute. My biggest concern is missing my family. Thats for another post.

A different view from @Mdh - an interview

Yesterday I had the wonderful opportunity to speak with Mark who is an incoming corps member in the San Francisco Bay region. One of the reasons I was so excited to interview Mark is because of his life story, which is outside the typical background of the average TFA CM. Mark has raised wonderful kids, has a tight knit family, and has a lifetime of experience he brings to the table, a narrative I found intriguing.  Both before and after my discussion with Mark I got to thinking more critically about how one’s life experiences influences success in the classroom, how age plays into the TFA experience, and finally how the organization is actively recruiting these non-traditional corps members a fact I had not yet known.

When we first started our chat I asked Mark how he came to apply to Teach For America.

 

Mark:  I first heard about TFA from one of my son's classmates. She had applied so I decided to look at the website. I had always hoped to find a way to become a teacher and I had heard about a program called "Oakland Teaching Fellows" which allows those of us without an education degree to get a credential through and experiential process. Then I heard about TFA and really liked what their program stood for. SO I gave it a shot. :  I come from a family of teachers and preachers -- almost everyone in the previous generations was one or the other. I felt like I was destined to become a preacher or teacher myself. Preacher seemed out of the question.

 

Mark’s entry into the program seemed almost natural. He has a passion for changing lives through teaching (as we’ll get to later). But his entry into childhood education came from word of mouth through his children which I also found fascinating. Raising a family is tough business and doing so while trying to graduate college is even tougher. Well Mark did it and applied to one of the most competitive post graduate programs outside of Harvard Law School and was accepted, which led naturally to a discussion of TFA’s recruitment of middle aged professionals.

 

Me: I think its a mix they do great things but just do a terrible job at presenting themselves as anything but a Brooks Brother's photo shoot. Think it would be good to mix it up like feature CM's like yourself [recruitment etc] and other professionals entering the classroom would diffuse a lot of the resistance they are getting from unions and veteran teachers...

 

Mark: I suspect that one reason I was accepted was that I break the stereotype a little. I give them someone who doesn't look like one of those brooks brother's ads. The woman who was recruiting me said that it's hard for them to find ways to connect with people of my generation and bring them into the application process. I suspect they would love to broaden the corps to include more of us non-traditional types but it's hard. None of the kids I knew who applied were accepted…I may try and encourage some of my older friends to consider this work in future years. I suppose it falls back on us to be recruiters for subsequent generations of corps members. I would have been more shocked if it didn't seem like TFA really wanted to find us older people. From the day the recruiter knew how old I was I would get regular reminders from her about deadlines and suggestions about what I could do to improve my chances of acceptance.

 

This was something I had never thought or knew about. It appears that Teach For America is actively seeking “non-traditional corps members” and its strategy on diversity just isn’t in skin color but in age/experiences as well which was very encouraging as one who bemoans the apparent homogeneity of the corps. But does this target on diversity in age actually mean better teachers? I suppose TFA is already compiling research on these figures as we speak but it was worth some discussion amongst the two of us.

 

Me:  wow that’s a great story. I guess that’s why I wanted to talk to you because you don't seem to fit the traditional mold of a cm (fresh out of college, young/ single) from my interactions with the organization it seems to be oriented towards young professionals. Beecher and I were talking about this the other day how CM's like you may fare better in the classroom than their peers. Do you think that your life "seniority" brings more stability to your teaching and transition mainly because you've dealt with tough stuff in your life ie- kids, marriage, life in general vs. a 23 year old who’s toughest day has been flunking a final or me a 24 year old who's just lost in the weeds..?

 

Mark: I'm not sure I'm any better prepared than you are. I have different tools. It's true that the younger CMs may not have the same experience with children that I've had -- raising two sons was a challenge -- but I'm sure you'll all learn quickly. In your favor, you have lots of energy and the students are likely to identify with you more readily. I'll be that "old" teacher -- probably not as exciting for the class as having someone young like you. I'm trying to keep an open mind about how students will react to an old guy.

 

Me: I suppose one thing in my favor is that I'm not nervous about relating to the kids. I have uncertainty, of course, but I'm not basing my success on whether the kids love me. I'm setting goals for them, and I will work my butt off to achieve the goals.

 

This was a notion I had not taken into account. As a person I have always leaned towards the side of doing things to make other’s like me especially in new situations. This may work in an office or internship setting in college but as a teacher it may be the largest pitfall many new teachers take in “getting their students to like them”. This concern was a main concern I listed on my Teach For America interview questionnaire during our final interview day. It was a question my interviewer was curious to ask me about. I answered that I worried about being too hard on my kids and therefore loosing favor with their parents and the children themselves. Here I can see having a strong solid foundation of life experience like Mark can be beneficial in establishing good rapport and respect with your students, a goal that may be difficult habits to master.

 

Connection with your students goes both ways with pro’s and con’s regardless of your age. Its just a matter of which one of these assets is most beneficial in your subject area based on your life experiences, views, and philosophies. To that point what is Mark’s subject area and placement and how does this tie into your overall goal:

 

Mark:  I'm assigned to Special Ed and our induction starts on the 21st

Me:…Special Ed is going to be tough you are a brave soul but good for you for taking that leap

Mark: I have a niece (she's now 37) who was a special Ed student all through her years in school. (She had significant developmental disabilities.) She is one of the reason's I want to do this. Her teachers were incredible and inspiring. I hope to have a similar impact in someone's life.

 

It is this motivation that seemed to be a the crux of Mark’s passion for teaching and it was a moving one. This is an individual who knows exactly what he wants to do and accomplish by being in the corps.

 

Finally we moved on the fluffy stuff. Mainly what was it going to be like for a middle aged man to be in a sea of 20-somethings and institute!

 

Mark : this is actually my first experience in a dorm. When I started school in the 1970s I lived off campus - first with my parents and then with Anna. I didn't finish my BA until last December (the 33 year plan) and during the late years I just lived at home, of course. The dorm life is something I'm looking forward to!

So…I asked about that ominous dress code everyone’s been chatting about:

 

Me: I’m already running up a tab plus just got some email about "dress code" so need to buy new clothes thinking crocs and blue jeans won't cut it.

 

Mark: Hah! I have to do some shopping, too. I've been working from home for the past 15 years and I pretty much live in jeans. I'm thinking I'll get a couple pairs of khaki pants and some plain white oxford shirts and wear the same thing every day. I'm not much for spending time on planning my fashion statements...

 

Well that was it. We actually talked more about other stuff in greater detail. If you are curious Mark has a fantastic blog over at http://www.backtoOakland.com. Which I encourage you to visit for some excellent reviews and exciting activities to do in the Bay area. Actually is making me think my town of Charlotte is quite lame. He also tweets at @mdh. Go visit the site and follow!

And finally a huge thanks to Mark for his time on Thursday!

This hasn't even started and I'm already pulling my hair out!

Its important to me for this blog to be an honest reflection of my TFA experience however It is equally important to keep it from becoming a bitching depository for my frustrations. The reason I am mentioning this is that the past two weeks have been very difficult for us financially. I know I had written another post about all the expenses about preparing but we are really struggling to get by. 

Having a child makes it logistically a nightmare. Most students have graduated from college are moving in with their parents and then get to go to induction and institute. Most will enjoy the hotel stay during induction. Most will enjoy not having to worry about big bills to put a house full of stuff in storage or having to get a huge ass uhaul twice. We currently live here in Charlotte. I had a job that paid the bills. They let me off two weeks early which really enhanced our money issues. Our lease is up so we have to move. Our parents are decent people but are not well off by any means. We have a home full of shit. We're also broke. 

Most people would say well they have family housing at institute. But it still pans out to be expensive even though its cheap on paper. Theres putting our stuff in storage, getting a moving truck, paying for family housing at induction (cant put Beecher and Taylor in a shared hotel room!) paying for family housing at institute, and then there's round zero that 4 week period between institute and your first day to which you have to get an apartment and have housing. oh did I mention you gotta move your stuff again...

I hate that I have to explain all of this. But if I don't people would just say: what are you complaining for cant you just go live in your mom's 2br apartment w/ your 9 year old sister and your spouse, and you daughter, and your mom.  Or why don't you just get a credit card (we already have 9 which are maxed out and our fico's scores are a mere 600 at best). We are going to get through this. We are selling everything we own that has any value. I haven't paid my student loans for the past two months. We are trying to make ends meet. Hopefully we will be better people for it (more humble more nimble). 

Timelines

I'm breezing along getting ready for institute. After being granted my re-assignment things have been hectic. By switching regions I was put on a different timeline. This meant re-registering for the praxis late since my subject had changed. It also meant me applying to the graduate school at my local university as directed by Teach For America. All of the new info I was getting via email blasts were very overwhelming and confusing. Yes there was already a spreadsheet with critical dates but I needed to personalize one for myself in order to fit my life. To make things easier I made a spreadsheet to outline the deadlines for all these new "action items". I simply read through all of my region's post on the TFANet website. Each of these posts contain dates/deadlines. I simply made an excel list of these dates or when I would have to have those objectives meat in the context of family and work, and had it placed in order by date. As we progressed I checked off each item. 

12-Apr	Praxis Registariton
15-Apr	Obtain 3 Refrences for UNCC
29-Apr	Complete online appl
30-Apr	Submit UNCC App
30-Apr	Complete FAFSA
1-May	DR. apt for health form due May 15
5-May	FBI background submit
25-May	Submit CMS app- (ID, Health, I-9,     Background)
15-May	Send DSU Registration &Payment Plan
15-May	Send Transcript Request (TFAx2, & CMS)
30-May	Take GRE/Miller
15-Jun	Register for UNCC Classes
30-Jun	Register for DSU classes

This is huge in keeping me on track. With working and a busy personal life this spreadsheet so far has keep me on track (well besides mailing those fingerprints!!!!) But it has meant remaining knowledgeable of whats coming ahead and how should I prepare. 

The Tab

Getting ready to teach is expensive! 

Praxis $150

Praxis Study book $20

Fingerprints $18

County Admin. of fingerprints $10

Dr. Apt for TB test- rec. by school system $30

Dr. Apt for physical rec. by school system $30

Graduate application program for licencure: $50

GRE for graduate program: $160

Payment plan program for Coursework at Institute    $50

Transcripts $30

Total: $548

Thats as of May 15th with even more to come. I am so stressed and overwhelmed at these financial burdens mainly because they have had to come directly out of my paycheck. Beecher has had to get a part-time job and my boss laid me off two weeks earlier than expected. 

To make matters worse I purchased a new laptop when I got my curriculum materials which required a CD drive. (my current one was not working and the screen had broke months earlier). But I was informed that we would be getting a donated PC at institute and my transitional funding was cut by that amount. Oh well guess I'm selling my computer since we are $550 in the hole. 

To be clear I am humbly grateful to be in the Corps and to have gotten transitional funding/grants. But as advised by others I underestimated the early sacrifices I would already have to make in order to have a successful transition. So in the short term we've sold our TV, our DVD player, and applied for some more credit cards. Its tough but its an investment. 

Transition to a Teaching Blog

So far a lot of the focus of this blog has been on applying to Teach For America and the application process. Well now all the applications have been submitted and everyone's been notified. What this means for the blog is a shift in my writing. The posts will begin to focus on the process of becoming a teacher and when August comes they will focus on being a teacher. 

As a future educator I hope to utlize the tools of the web to be an effective teacher. Take these two examples of educators using the web to aid in their teaching and aid their students! Theres one caveat: they are not TFA'ers. I encourage you to follow these excellent educators on Twitter and via their insightful blogs. There are so many wonderful blogs and twitter folks out there talking about great stuff and its a wider world out there than the one TFA pushes which leaves one feeling fenced in with the Teach For America only crowd.

The reason why I bring these up is because TFA has created its own social network. This is a great resource but it only gives you teaching from the perspective of TFA'ers. I prefer to have a more diversified view as I reach out to converse/collaborate with other educators. The Ed Reform movement is a lot more than Teach For America and if all one does is read everything from the perspective of TFA they are only getting a tip of a wide reaching and rather enriching community. 

@msstewart who blogs at http://inforgood.wordpress.com/

@johnspencer who writes a WONDERFUL blog at http://jtspencer.blogspot.com/

Since I've gotten off on that tangent. I'm looking forward to regular blogging about the transition into the corps and my teaching career! Just have to drill it in 

BLOG WEEKLY!!

Alternative vs. Traditional- Teach For America as a model for traditional certification

As I delve into my pre-instiute work for Teach For America I am noticing that the work is focused directly on the reality of low income classrooms. It is focused on the means to which teachers achieve success in the most neediest classrooms in America. It is more based on the real world experience of teachers rather than an academic approach to primary education. This has been a surprise but a welcome one and it is why Teach For America is defined in the education world as an alternative route to teaching. The traditional route is:

Someone who takes on an education major in college

Goes to a graduate education program

Then gets certified to teach K-12.

Programs like Teach For America take a different approach where the only requirement to start teaching is a four year college degree. Critics of this approach say it puts inexperienced teachers in the classrooms even though they have the foundational understanding of education gained through graduate study. Proponents say that these teachers have been successful despite this gap and not much practical knowledge is gained through the “traditional” model. I agree (but haven’t always) with the latter.

As of late, studies have shown that Teach For America teachers are just as (if not more) effective in regards to student achievement as their traditional peers. Teach For America’s targeted work on focusing internally on its weaknesses, and improving itself exponentially year after year will only prove that targeted non-traditional teacher education is the way to go.

Often I have spoken to teachers who think that their time in graduate school being “certified” was a waste. While in college, I myself worked in my University’s School of Education where it was a battle by the forward thinking administration to get the accreditation bodies on board with a curriculum catered to real classroom experiences. Many complain about entire courses devoted to education theory developed by plenty of dead white men from centuries earlier. Many traditional teachers complain that they have not found this information valuable in helping their students achieve. As I delve into my teacher prep through the alternative route with Teach For America I am noticing that the instruction is very targeted. Rather than “cramming” two years of the traditional education graduate program into a summer institute, Teach For America is focusing teaching observed points of success.

Preparation within this alternative program focuses on concise points of learning that have maximum effectiveness in the classroom. For example, rather than a seminar course on the theoretical notions of education, the targeted Teach For America structure will focus on overcoming specific poverty challenges within the classroom. Within weeks of Teach For America’s summer institute, CMs are placed in Student Teaching positions at local district summer schools- something that doesn’t occur for several semesters within traditional schools of education.

The problem is not with the traditional organizations versus the non-traditional ones. Rather due to the increased scrutiny of the new approach of alternative certification methods, they have been subject to more scrutiny thus making sure teacher training is streamlined, and thus more (or just as effective) when compared to the traditional model. A lot can be learned from this. If traditional learning was to take what Teach For America does over the summer training and through the two years with its CM’s, then most certainly a two year graduate program will prove more effective.

In my opinion, this is the solution: If traditional teaching programs embrace targeted learning the same way alternative programs are forced to do in just one summer than they will ultimately be more effective. The result will be better teachers in our nations schools. Teach For America is NOT the solution. It is simply a means to an end. It can serve as an example of what schools of Education are not getting right and thus allow them to make target curriculum changes in order to better compete and hopefully perform better than their alternative counterparts. Even if Teach For America looses five years down the road the real winners will be America’s students.

Passing the Praxis

Many of the steps towards day one in the classroom is passing the Praxis I and II. As of last Thursday I was notified that I had a passing score for the Praxis II. The Praxis I still remains to be taken but passing the subject based Praxis II was a huge achievement. 

My major in college was Political Science and I am slated to teach secondary English. The English Subject Area Assessment (English Language, Literature, and Composition: Content and Knowledge) posed a difficult challenge. Many of the subjects/topics covered were ones from my Freshman and Sophomore years in college and/or my Sr. year in High School. Since it took me five years to graduate and I am taking the exam nearly a year after my graduation we are talking about content covered in 2005, 2004, and 2003 at most seven years ago.

That being the case I pretty much came into the exam prep a blank slate. The most challenging was having to re-learn the different time periods in British and American literature. In doing so it was imperative to know the authors who wrote in each period, their works, and the content of their works. Interpreting the works of these various authors and the time periods they wrote them in proved extremely challenging. 

I spent a solid two weeks before the exam preparing and taking notes. The main instrument to my success was the purchase of the CliffsTestPrep book for the Praxis II titled Praxis II: English Subject Area Assessments. While to book was organized a little funny it provided great guidance and a decent practice test for the 0041. I would recommend a similar study book for anyone taking the Praxis exams especially if their subject assignment is not in a subject of direct expertise (ie your college major). This book was only $12 off of Amazon and it was worth every penny. It was extremely helpful that about half of that time was during a week off from work. I found myself wondering how I would have done this if I were still in school full time. For this I was grateful not to be currently in school and for the early deadline on getting into Teach For America. 

Exam day was intense. I arrived at my testing site on time but it was terribly crowded and by the time I found a  parking space and ran around the campus I was late. However the line was snaked around the building to get in so I wasn't too late in the end. The detailed interpretation of literature passages took up the most time and were the bulk of the questions. It would have been great to have developed some strategies for answering those longer passages quicker. You have to remain in the room the entire 2hrs. and on my test I ran out of time with around 10 questions left. When the proctor called time I quickly filled in A's on my remaining questions. 

In the end I passed by about 5pts. It would have been great to have done better but I am ecstatic I passed. On a Teach For America conference call myself and other newly accepted CM's were told that the Praxis exams were "walks in the park". I could see for the super high achieving college student this could be an easy task. To conclude: I strongly believe that one should take some time to study for the exams at least to alleviate anxiety. My experience may not be representative of the entire corps which may perform as a group much better on the Praxis than I did. 

Good Luck