Right Words

        Teaching is a skill that requires more than exposition of information.  Teachers work with young, impressionable people who are vulnerable to the words they hear.  Children are still learning about sarcasm, irony and hyperbole.  Those who work with them must always be careful of the way they use words with their students.  The following story illustrates an unintended positive result from a teacher's words.

        Jolie was a pretty typical teenager from my point of view, even though I really don’t remember her well.  She was undergoing a cognitive and physical transformation like most of the sixteen year old studnets in my U.S. History class.   She didn’t particularly like school, like most of my students, but she wasn’t oppositional.  She dressed appropriately, from a teacher’s point of view.  She didn’t have any of the outward characteristics that marked her as a risk taking narcissistic adolescent. No spiked hair, sexuality or crazy colors.   She was chatty and polite.  I remember she sat at the front and to the right of the podium in the large classroom I had been assigned.  She did her work, but missed more school than a learner can afford and still succeed.  I don’t remember what grade she got or even if she finished the school year.  I do know she transformed me as a teacher.  

Now my brain gets fuzzy and I can not tell you much more about her.  I spent my time practicing effective teaching and although I truly enjoyed my students, I didn’t really involve myself in their lives.  I had three kids of my own, 130 other students, two dogs, one wife and a soccer team I coached.  I was a pretty typical high school teacher, who after 15 years of teaching had found a rhythm that satisfied my life.  I had discussions with my students about life, behavior, schooling and other topics that many teenagers find more interesting than U.S. History.  I considered myself student centered, but in retrospect I was curriculum oriented and under pressure to present a certain amount of information on a schedule determined by our department chairman.

I began my teaching career in the Marine Corps teaching electronics.  I learned how to pour information into a brain and use discipline to make my students listen to me.  When I began teaching I was a follower of B.F. Skinner, the behaviorist.  Data in according to rules, apply certain formulas for information retention, and mix in the proper balance of discipline and reward.  That was my philosophy and it applied to all students,.  

After I was discharged I followed my wife’s suggestion and became a school teacher, like her.  I went to the university and encountered other ways of thinking about teaching; I was introduced to other philosophies, open schools, and alternative methods of discipline.  When I went into the classroom I continued to teach the way the Marine Corps had trained me to teach.    

I did not truly understand the power of words.  I thought if I loudly and firmly that was enough.  But, what we say to children and how we say it can have powerful effects over their thinking for many years.  It is sort of like one day finding a plant growing in your garden that you don’t remember planting.  One of the clearest examples of this was shown to me by the eight year old son of a friend.  We were playing a game of Boce, before we began he and I had a discussion about cheating.  My parting words were, “Cheaters are losers!”  After my side lost the game Dylan announced that I was a cheater.  That wasn’t what I meant for him to learn.  See what I mean, words are powerful and teachers have innumerable opportunities to grow unintended plants.

By the time Jolie had become a student in my class I had learned many ways of teaching my subject and managing my class, but I still did not understand the unintended consequences of words.  I did chat with my students from time to time.  I was not such an effective teacher that every moment was spent on content.  I tried to give my students time to make their own meaning of the information, and we often had conversations about things that were troubling them.  They were always interested in news about views of society about teens, romance, risk-taking, and other tidbits I tried to incorporate into my classes.  By now I knew that ordering adolescents around is like stacking ping pong balls and didn’t use the same type of bombastic language I used just after my discharge.  I realize now I was on a journey of discovery about education that was part of my maturation process.  Jolie helped me to complete that process.

The year after Jolie was in my class I could not recall her features and barely remembered her name.  She however remembered me.  One day  before Christmas break I entered my office and there on my desk was a letter from Jolie.  I must confess that what she said was the result of unintentional gardening, but what blossomed was truly wonderful.  She explained that she had been depressed, dropped out of school, and continued a downward spiral that eventually caused her to attempt suicide.  I say attempt with relief and joy, for what a loss each young life is.  What was truly wonderful was her explanation for her recovery and decision to live.  She explained that I told her things in class that upon reflection gave her hope and confidence about herself and her future.  

Jolie’s note gave me hope that I was accomplishing something worthwhile.  It is true if you can save one child it is worth any effort you have put into others.    She caused me to understand that kindness is the most important thing we can teach.   It is not the curriculum that matters, it is how we treat our children that is important.  With the right words we can create a garden of beauty.

What would happen if schools encouraged kindness?

Information about Kindness in Education
Teacher's Guide for Teaching Kindness
A to Z Teacher Stuff - Teacher Tips: Promoting Kindness
Random Acts of Kindness Lesson Plan for Teachers
Acts of Kindness | In Your Classroom

Thoughts from Yrisarri
Bella said, “They can make me come to school, but they can’t make me learn anything.”  This was 1994 and Bella was a 16 year old girl responding to my question of what her parents would think when I told them she did absolutely no work in my class.  Bella taught me about motivation, I had to work very hard and be very nice to Bella.  She wasn’t a problem student, she was very quiet, she just sat at her desk and reflected all period long.  In the end I won Bella over and she began to work, but only because I did not write her off and treated her decision not to work with respect, kindness finally won her over. 

I remember a third grade grade teacher in an elementary school where 1/2 of the students had to take her class.  She was always punishing children by isolating and belittling them.  Her message was that these bad little boys and girls have to be taught how to behave.  Yet, when treated with respect these same students responded with excellent behavior.

What brings these stories to mind was the news a couple weeks ago about an elementary principal who had written a letter mocking a second grade student’s ability to learn.  It was meant as a letter to his staff, but this kind of leadership encourages truly poor teachers.  Rather than discrediting an entire profession for failing test scores, let’s look beyond superficial evaluation methods and find out why our children are not motivated to get an education in a country that provides unlimited opportunities for those who succeed in our school systems.  The teachers I would like to see leave the profession are the ones who cause the Bellas to hate school, maybe she had the 3rd grade teacher who thought little boys and girls need to be taught how to behave!

Society seems to have become a place where calling names and discrediting others is more important that solving problems .  The data we are gathering in education is being used for finger pointing and punishment rather than evaluation and improvement.(Diane Ravitch: Education has become search and destroy mission and teachers are often the targets | Get Schooled )  It seems to me that rather than acquiesce to the lack of civility and inability to get along with others education should view this as a problem to tackle by treating students in a respectful manner. 

The competitive and punitive nature of our education system causes young children to behave in ways we can not fully appreciate.  One unkind word can change the course of a child’s thinking about how people should treat each other.  I would like to share a Chinese story that I think addresses this problem.

Chang Kung and the Golden Secret

Chang Kung was a good and kind grandfather with a very large family. He had so many children, grandchildren and great -grandchildren, that his house was full of people all of the time. His house had to grow larger to hold everyone, and so it became a collection of houses, side by side, in a big circle around a yard.

The unusual thing about Chang Kung's huge family wa s that nobody ever quarreled! The children never teased each other, or got into fights. The grown-ups never got mad at each other. They never scolded the children, or spanked them.

Stories about this family that never quarreled spread over all the countryside until even the Emperor heard about them. He said “I wonder is these stories are really true. I shall go find out.

The Emperor rode to Chang Kung's house in his sedan chair, carried on the shoulders of four men dressed in red. His guards carried long bows and arrows, and other attendants followed, pIaying flutes and harps.

The Emperor visited all the houses of the family of Chang Kung, going from room to room, talking to everyone he met. Finally, he said to Chang Kung, "It is true that no cross words are spoken within your walls. You must have a golden secret in order to keep so many people living together in such peace. I would like to know your secret. "

Old Chang Kung took a brush and ink and a bamboo tablet. He carefully wrote one word. Then he wrote the same word over and over, until he had written it a hundred times. This is the word he wrote.

The Emperor said, "You have written many words, but at the same time you have written only one word. "

Chang Kung said, "That one word is my golden secret. That one word is kindness, over and over without any ending. "

The Emperor was so pleased that he said, "Let all the families in China learn the golden secret of Chang Kung and his family!" The Emperor had pictures of Chang Kung painted so that people could hang them on their kitchen walls to remind them to keep the golden secret.

Help not Punishment for Struggling Teachers, Schools and Students

Some Useful Websites
AAA Math features a comprehensive set of interactive arithmetic lessons. Unlimited practice is available on each topic which allows thorough mastery of the concepts. A wide range of lessons (Kindergarten through Eighth grade level) enables learning or review to occur at each individual's current level.
Energy Kids-Find energy related stories, hands-on activities, and research articles for your classroom! These curriculum-based lessons are separated by age-grade.
The Open Door Web Site is a reference source for both students and teachers.  The contents of this site are designed for use by students between the ages of 9 and 17.

Articles about Cognition, Affective Education and Pyschomotor Benefits
Emotional Intelligence Is the Missing Piece -This article is explains how social and emotional learning can help students successfully resolve conflict, communicate clearly, solve problems, and more.
Why Exercise Makes you Less Anxious - At a time when high stakes testing is imposed upon our students this article by Gretchen Reynolds point makes it clear that Physical Education should be more important to our curriculum than before.
Proficient Readers Need Good School Libraries - Gaby Chapman's article focuses on the fact that studies show that reading achievement in a school is directly related to the quality of its library but says,

School libraries are slowly but steadily being replaced by an onslaught of packaged reading programs designed to teach “virtual reading,” in which students can learn everything about reading without actually doing it.

Book Review
Mind Reading- by Allison Gopink  is a book review for Stanislas Dehaene's new book about the reading and the brain called Reading in the Brain: The Science and Evolution of a Human Invention .  Neuroscientist are discovering that reading has not been around long enough for humans to have become an inate part of the human brain.

Thoughts From Yrisarri
In my years of teaching and working in schools I came across a few poor teachers.  But, as I listen to to the movement for reform it seems as if there are many more bad teachers than I ever imagined.  One of the cornerstones of the current push from the Secretary of Education and other reformers is to rid the schools of bad teachers.  It seems that teacher unions and teachers themselves are to blame for the education disaster in America!

Once again the Department of Education is missing the point of the future for our children.  It is more important in today's workforce to know how to cooperate, punitively firing teachers who are deemed "bad" teachers by some objective or subjective criteria, is not going to help create a culture of learning that teaches our children good values.  Competition is between companies, not between workers in the companies.   The current thinking seems to be that competition is the missing equation in education.  This includes students and the teaching force. It is as if teachers and students are always applying for the job but never get to practice their skills.

Instead of calling for dismissal of teachers for doing poor work, let us first decide that we will help any teacher who does not meet basic benchmarks without threatening the job of someone who invested personal treasure in themselves to become a teacher.  Perhaps schools that don't meet the benchmarks can be assured that their community will be helped without a threat of takeover or dismantling of a community investment.  Maybe we can even make it clear to our students that we want to help them not fail them.  I think that message is not received by many of our students today.

What I suggest is that our first instinct be to help others rather than dismiss them.  One of the great reforms for education could be to create a culture of kindness and a tradition of caring about others.  We can begin this by finding ways to "dismiss" the punitive natures of some of our classrooms and schools.  One way to begin this reform is by committing to help struggling teachers, schools and students rather than punish them when they fail. 

Thoughts on Teacher Compensation plus Websites and Articles For Teachers

Sites of the Week

Open Library- Teachers  and  school librarians might be interested in this book website featuring 23,747,948 books (including 1,111,774 with full-text).  Once you have located a book you can browse for purchase or find it at a library.  Some are catalogued and some can be read online.

Watch Know - The Internet is full of useful information, but it's disorganized and often unreliable.  This site is collecting all the best free educational videos made for children, and making them findable and watchable on one website.  Many of the videos feature children sharing their knowledge.

Highlights Magazine - A great magazine has moved to the web and has many interesting games, puzzles, and activities for young children.

Pestworld for Kids - Here is a great site for youngsters interested in bugs.  Checkout the video contest underway that can earn $3000 for your school!

Articles of Interest 

Education Alone Can Not Save Our Economy by Anthony Cody in Teacher Magazine writes the following in his blog Living in Dialog:

Our goal should not be the degree at the end of college. Our goal is knowledge and the ability to do useful, creative and productive things in the world. The quality of education needs to be measured not by how well we get our students to score on tests, but on how capable they are at interacting powerfully with the real world. Are they able to do skillful work? Are they able to express themselves through writing, music and art? Can they invent solutions to the problems that have landed in their laps?

Getting it Wrong: Surprising Tips on How to Learn by Henry L. Roediger and Bridgig Finn in Scientific American Online debunks the myth of errorless learning.  Research shows that learning becomes better if conditions are arranged so that students make errors.  Just remember how much you learned when you went over the test in class the next day. 

Kindness

School has always been a place that gathers frustrated people whose unkind words are often heard on the playground, library, classrooms and the office! John Medina, in his book Brain Rules, has as his 8th rule "stressed brains don't learn the same way."

When frustration is released with unkind words, stress is one of the side-effects and learning is the casualty. The Red Robin Foundation is doing something about this problem by providing grants of up to $15,000 with their U-Act program.

The goal of the Red Robin Foundation U-ACT Program is to encourage kindness among students and help create a sense of neighborliness inside and outside of school settings. U-ACT which stands for Unbridled Acts, or random acts of kindness, is a character-building initiative specifically for middle and junior high schools with grades six through eight, which aims to inspire and energize students about the value of being kind to others.

You can find out more at http://www.redrobin.com/rrfoundation/uactprogram.aspx
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