Louder and Slower. Repeat.

Some days when teaching, I just can't seem to be able to explain the objective of the day to my students. It refuses to doesn't click with them. Like my Monday, trying to explain how to use a ruler. Either the kids are turning off their brains for the day as a collective whole, or I can't break it down enough or can't articulate another explanation well enough -- or just flat out can't remember my math (like today, I blanked and couldn't remember how to turn a percentage into a fraction. Whoops!).

The hardest part of teaching math is in the basics, really. It's easier to explain the how than the why -- always. Like, why is the formula for an equilateral triangle A="s" squared divided by 3 x square root of 3?

I actually have no idea. But I can plug in those numbers like nobody's business.

And why does 30/100 = 30%?

No idea either. And apparently, based on today, I don't know the How on that one either.

Most of the time I feel like one of those stereotypically rude American tourists who, when they find that someone can't understand them because of a language barrier, decide that the best way to be understood is just to repeat exactly the same thing again, only louder and slower.

Louder and slower.

Using my best teacher voice. Fighting to ignore the bewildered eyes and concerned expressions.

And then I grade those assessments or mini-tests, and my heart sinks. 0/3. 0/3, 1/3. Ten percent mastery of the objective. Zero percent master of the objective. There are few worse sensations of disappointment than realizing that the last hour of struggle -- an hour of consequence cards, dry-erase marker races, giant attitudes in tiny bodies, and countless explanations of the difference between fourths and eights on a ruler -- was all in vain. And I'll have to re-teach the objective entirely.

Blah.

It makes those days of 80% mastery look like bliss. Feel like bliss. And those are the days I hold on to. Yesterday was a zero percent mastery day. Today was a 90% mastery day. And hopefully tomorrow will follow suit.

But I never know.

In teaching, I can bring my A game every day and still get less than awesome results. It's never the same day. Never. My inputs don't directly relate to my outputs, and I could honestly teach the same thing, verbatim, from Day 1 to Day 2 and get different results each day.

Because in the distance between my brain and their brains, knowledge has to fight hundreds of factors -- from sleepiness to empty stomachs to sheer boredom to the biggest, most anguished middle school attitudes I've ever seen. That's some pretty stiff competition for attention.

At the very least though, I can always say that those kids sure do keep me on my toes. No rocking back and resting in this profession. It just isn't possible if you want to be good.

What Teachers Make

You Know You're at Institute When...

1. Waking up at 5:30 a.m. is sleeping in.

2. Your backpack, straining at the seams, is twice as wide as you are.

3.  Averaging four hours of sleep a night is standard.

4. You debate if eating at lunch at 10:00 a.m. is too early.

5. You talk in acronyms. "During my ODC, my CMA talked about my INM during my AIT."

6. Everyone understands your acronyms.

7. TFA-speak is common and overflows into your normal lives.

"If I plan to be married by the time I'm 25, then I'm going to need to backward plan to make sure that happens."

"In the spirit of partnership and community, please use some urgency while in the shower. It's my turn."

8. We consider using behavior narration on people we know .

"I see that Becca's boyfriend bought her flowers. Kelly's boyfriend bought her flowers for no reason. Erica's boyfriend buys her gifts."

(Note: Behavior narration will definitely be getting it's own post sometime soon.)

9.  People talk about their students constantly, in all settings, and refer to them as their kids.

10. Dark rooms and comfortable chairs are to be avoided at all times when awake. Otherwise you wont be anymore.

Teacher Moment of the Week

This week's Teacher Moment is brought to you by the seedy world of insects, out to destroy classrooms one whiteboard at a time.

There are bugs everywhere here.

EVERYWHERE.

If you think you are safe from mosquitos because you're inside, you are wrong. And don't think that the cockroaches and spiders wont find you. They can sense your fear. Even the bug truck that comes around campus at night, spraying toxic bug repellent into the air to ward off the swarms of mosquitos (literally swarms -- big black clouds of them) cannot keep them away for long.

Yesterday in class, I had my teacher moment.

The class was pretty well-behaved for the day. I'd shut down the trouble-maker early, and he was participating along with the rest of the group. Point for me.

I had them sitting quietly and listening to me as I wrapped up my lesson for the day (I think we were learning about order of operations). While I was wrapping up some of my last thoughts, Ms. H started writing her objective on the board for her class, which was next. The students naturally were paying attention to her and not me, which was fine since she was moving more than me. Law of physics or something.

Anyway, suddenly Ms. H squeals and takes a fast step backward. The peace was broken as students started pointing, laughing and squealing about the spider on the board. Turning, I looked for the little punk who was about to destroy my hard-earned silent class.

It was just a daddy long leg. A rather large one, mind you (leg span of a silver dollar), but just a daddy long leg.

Normally I hate killing insects. But I have my priorities. So without thinking -- and with only one thing on my mind (regaining order) -- I stepped up and with one swing smacked the spider with the palm of my hand.

Turning back to the class as I brushed the insect off my palm, I resumed without skipping a beat.

"As I was saying..."

You should have seen their faces. Pure gold.

Ms. D -- 1; Spider, Destroyer of Hard-Earned, Well-Behaved Classroom -- 0.

It was a good day.

Teaching with Urgency

Assessments are completed. Our students -- going into ninth grade -- are reading at a 5th grade level on average. They passed barely 30% of their math assessment. Science isn't looking good either.

When we got those numbers, a fellow teacher on my team and I couldn't help but tear up. My tears were mostly from anger. I am so angry that someone let these students pass from grade to grade without mastering the basics -- or even without teaching them the basics in the first place.

It breaks my heart.

Their student surveys also break my heart -- and make me determined to fight with everything I have to help them reach their growth goals this summer.

These students want to be lawyers, nurses, and athletes. And when they asked what they'd do if they won the lottery, the majority of students said things like "I'd pay my mom's medical bills," "I'd buy a house," and "I've give to charity" (often to the homeless).

My students are thinking about huge issues and dealing with things every day that I never had to deal with as an eighth grader. And yet their altruism, even in imaginary circumstances, makes me so proud to be their teacher for a short while.

It also gives me an intense sense of determination and urgency. I have 17 days to push these students to reach not only their tangible growth goals but also tap into their imaginations and learn to see their dreams as a realizable future.

Now, more than ever, do I wish there were 36 or 48 or 60 hours in a day. I need that time!

Inspiration from the Times, with a Healthy Dose of Lesson Planning

A huge thanks to my friend Madison for passing this article, "It's Not About You," on to me today. Just when I need encouragement the most, my amazing support system at home pulls out something new for me. I'm one lucky gal, I tell ya.

My favorite quote from the article is:
"Most people don’t form a self and then lead a life. They are called by a problem, and the self is constructed gradually by their calling."

So inspiring.

I hope that at the end of this two-year journey as a teacher in the Black Belt of Alabama, I'll have the beginnings of a fulfilling life -- shaped by this immense challenge and the sense of purpose it gives me.

This is what keeps me going at 11:53 p.m., with two hours left of work and a 5:15 a.m. wake-up call.

Lord help us all.

P.S. I love my kids. All headstrong sixteen of them. Aside from being a handful in the management category, we asked them all what they want to be what they grow up. The answers? Nurses, Lawyers, Teachers, Professional Athletes. I couldn't be more excited to push them toward those goals. It's never to early to start preparing for those dreams.

First Day as a Teacher

Today is my first day as a real teacher. The first of many, many, many. I am so excited to meet my students and get to know them.

It's a pretty basic day. We'll be giving them all assessment tests (mine in math) to see where they are in each subject and to see what we need to be teaching over the four weeks of summer school. My students all have four teachers -- two math teachers, one science, and one English Language Arts. Besides giving three assessment tests, the four of us will be going over various policies and procedures of our classroom.

I get to invest students in our classroom's Big Goal.

Basically, my bottom line is that we all need to reach 100% of our individual goals this summer, so we can get on the right foot to be successful in high school. And success in high school leads to success in college -- my ultimate goal for all my students. Before teaching that mini-lesson, I still need to look up cool statistics about average income differences between people without high school diplomas, with high school diplomas, and with college degrees. There's nothing like some quality statistics to throw at people to prove a point.

Wish me luck on my first day!

My First Weekend in the Delta

Hours of Sleep Last Night: 8
Mosquito Bites Counted: 6
New Thing Tried: Fried Green Tomatoes
Temperature: Excessive Heat Warning (Feels like 106)

Picture Review of My Weekend Adventures

An excursion to Po'Monkey...

BamaCorps dinner at the Blue Levee... 

Decorating my classroom with my teaching team for the summer...

I'll definitely blog about all of these later, when I have the time. Until then, enjoy the pictures and wish me luck tomorrow!

P.S. Happy Father's Day to my Papa! Love you!

The Workload of a Teacher

The work has begun. It's difficult to describe just how difficult this training to be a teacher thing is. We have 15-17 hour days, stuffed with classes, lesson plan writing, and more classes. There's a lot of sitting, a lot of shifting/fidgeting to stay awake, and a lot of eating little snacks to survive until the next mealtime.

I'll have to wait until the weekend to go in-depth on what I've been doing all week (and the awesome things I've been learning), since I desperately need sleep right now. Suffice it to say, I am incredibly in awe and appreciation of any of my teachers who were successful in the classroom. SO. MUCH. WORK. 

However, thank goodness I have my BamaCorps family to get me through. Lessons plans are so much more fun when you aren't writing them alone.

Transformational Change in the United States

Today I learned that 60% of adults in Detroit are functionally illiterate, meaning that they operate with on a first or second grade reading level.

The average literacy level in the United States is eighth grade.

Eighth grade.

I am dumbfounded. How is it possible that, in one of the most developed nations in the world, we still have adult citizens who can't read? How does this happen? How could we let this happen?

We are barraged with facts like that all day, and they are sobering. For all our highly set goals and ambitious plans, there is still so much work that must be done.

Needless to say, I left my Literacy Specialist session today feeling a little overwhelmed.

But then at dinner, I got to thinking. While the challenge is monstrous, the need is extreme and this Institute alone is contributing significantly to the solution.

My Numbers...*
*A rough, hazy estimation done in my head over the dinner table.
*Not to be taken as fact. I haven't looked anything up. Yet.

There are about 800 corps members here at Delta State (I don't remember the exact number, so I'll pick a nice even number for prettier results).

Then, let's say that out of the 800, about 5% of us aren't really good teachers and actually completely bomb it in the classroom (a high estimate, just to be on the safe side).

That leaves 760 teachers.

Out of the 760, about 30% of us might be just good, average teachers, doing well but not making significant gains. That's about 280 people, leaving 480 excellent teachers. Four hundred eighty exceptional, ambitious teachers.

And that's just one institute.

There are eight institutes training teachers across the country this summer, so multiply eight by 480. That gives me 3840 top-notch new teachers training this summer across the United States.

That, my friends, means that there will be almost 4000 transformational new teachers entering classrooms this fall, joining older TFA corps members and veteran educators in the fight to end educational inequity.

And when 4000 teachers each significantly influence the lives of their 50 students (a rough average), that gives us a stunning 200,000 children who will be touched by new corps members ALONE in the coming year.

Lives changed, transformed by the power of an excellent education and the opportunities that will open from that. That's not even counting TFA alum and other non-TFA veteran educators who have been fighting this fight for looooong before TFA even existed. And it's already a powerful number.

I think I'm going to need to write those numbers down to remind me in the tough times these coming weeks that I am not even close to alone in this fight. Because one person cannot possibly change the status quo alone, but as a collective, we can push this movement forward and create lasting, transformation change in the world of education and in our students' lives.

Bam. If that doesn't give me a sense of purpose, I don't know what will.