#cavern of learning

I didn’t get to write this entry sooner because I had to drive to my dad’s house after work today, but hi! Here I am! Happy break to everyone who’s got tomorrow off, too, and condolences to those of you who don’t.

Today was one of those days that was pretty chill in my world, but definitely not in other people’s worlds. Like, the SRO did not have a chill day. The Principal did not have a chill day. I don’t know what happened, but I know they were very busy with whatever it was. Meantime, I was in my Cavern of Learning with Mrs. T, editing rough drafts of Epic Book Papers. It was a very quiet cavern today- so much so that when Ms. N walked in, she asked what had happened! In fact, two things: rough drafts were due today (so some students were feeling the time crunch), and I’d pointed out that striking up conversations just because they’d been told not to wasn’t original, edgy, or impressive. I honestly wasn’t expecting that to be as effective as it was, but I’m not going to complain!

I spent a good chunk of time helping one of our highest needs students with her writing. She hasn’t mastered paragraph-building yet, so I just kept asking her questions and having her write down her answers until she had an appropriate amount of information on one of her book’s themes. Then I had her “enter key and tab” (the phrase many students, not just her, are more likely to know than “start a new paragraph”) and started the process over again. It was slow going, and we took lots of breaks so she wouldn’t get overwhelmed, but a full draft appeared one sentence at a time. Ultimately, when she saw that she had two pages of writing, she looked a bit awed. I’m counting that as a big win. 

The class’ attention held, really, until about the last ten minutes before Block 4 ended. After that, it was all giggles, silly noises, practicing basketball moves with crumpled paper, and other shenanigans. Mrs. T and I ended up just laughing and letting it happen. The students did so well for the majority of the day, so it’s all good. 

My APUSGOV students reacted to the news that Governor Sanford had suspended his presidential campaign by wondering if it was something they said. I used my dryest tone of voice to remind them that correlation is not causation, but also reiterated the fact that both he and I were impressed with their questions. One of Joe Biden’s staffers paid them a visit today, and they put him through his paces. They also seriously misused the Remind app to text me commentary (like “So how about that Hyde Amendment?”) throughout this staffer’s presentation; they do that when we’re at political events, too. I should discourage it, and yet... 

My APUSGOV lesson was on the media, and it was a good one. With the primary coming, I have lots of examples of how candidates use traditional media and social media, how the media covers elections, what impact selective exposure is having. It’s all really obvious, they see it everyday. I touched on some of the things I thought they might be less aware of, too, like the use of data and social media algorithms to shift people’s opinions. I showed a quick clip about Cambridge Analytica that blew their minds a bit.

After APUSGOV, I opened the wall between my classroom and Mrs. T’s to create the Cavern of Learning. Mrs. T was in meetings for most of the World/English double block, but today was The Me Show anyhow (next time, it’s The Mrs. T show). Students read about the aftermath of the Rwandan Genocide for homework, and today they did a group assignment examining statistics from 1993 and 2019 to see how much had changed. We had great conversations about how to interpret data- like, what’s it mean when the GDP per capita and the poverty rate are both high- and about what had happened in Rwanda and the surrounding countries. 

After that, students grabbed headphones and laptops, and watched an excerpt from Fight Like Soldiers, Die Like Children, a documentary about Romeo Dallaire’s efforts to eradicate the use of child soldiers, so they could see what the situation is like in Central Africa today, what’s being done and what isn’t... Plus, they’re familiar with Dallaire from watching Shake Hands With the Devil, so there’s a connection there. A bunch of them came up at the end of class to tell me they’d liked the lesson, and that the film was interesting, and that they learned a lot.

So that’s a win. 

The faculty had an ugly sweater contest today (to the great amusement of our students), so I went to work wearing jeans and a fleece hoodie that looks like Christmas threw up all over it. I didn’t win- Ms. J, who wore a Rudolph poncho and crazy patterned leggings, did- but it’s all good. That fleece is SO comfortable.

It’s a B day, so Mrs. T and I did pretty much the same thing we did yesterday in World/English: helped students finish their research projects. I spent a lot of time with two, in particular, who are a little nervous about presenting in front of a class.  There was a third student whose work I really wanted to see because he’s been struggling a bit, but, unfortunately, he was absent today. D’oh!

While some students worked right up until the bell, others finished with lots of time to spare, and took to decorating the Cavern with paper chains, paper flowers, and festive drawings. I had two seniors come in during Block 5 to retake the last unit test, and both kind of did a double take (at my fleece and at my decorated room). Also, one of the freshmen who hadn’t turned in a book paper took the initiative to come up (from study hall), finish it, and turn it in. It’s great to see him taking responsibility for his academic performance, problem-solving, using time more effectively.

Every administrator at my school is responsible for observing and evaluating the teachers in one or two departments, and The Principal is responsible for observing and evaluating the department heads, so technically he was observing Mrs. T when he walked into the Cavern of Learning this morning, but, of course, he ended up seeing both of us. Our students were outlining and/or drafting their book papers, so one of us was always walking around and monitoring the whole room while the other was helping students one-on-one. We kept swapping who was doing what (we don’t do that consciously, it just kind of happens, at this point), so The Principal saw us both doing a lot of different things. Bonus: he saw me showing two students how to use the Snap & Read extension, which is THE COOLEST THING EVER, so he got to see that we make use of the resources we’re afforded.

Afterwards, I fielded his questions about how the whole unit is set up, since he’s only seen snippets: students learn about modern African history in World while reading a book set in modern Africa (we have 18 book options) in English; then we combine classes and they write the paper about their book’s themes; after that, they research any topic their book addresses- ie, apartheid, or the Lost Boys of Sudan- and do a formal presentation of their findings to their classmates. Ta-da. The Epic Book Paper and Research Project. 

The Principal said he loved it.

That’s a huge win for us.

After school, I was supposed to be at four meetings, two of which were at the same time in totally different buildings, so I actually went to three: my department meeting, the union executive board meeting, and winter sports sign-ups. The one I missed was the meeting for winter sport coaches, but one of the perks of being a lowly assistant coach is that my presence at that isn’t mandatory. The Head Coach filled me in on everything when I arrived for the sports sign-up meeting. Also, my department meeting was short, so I was able to grab food and coffee on the way to the board meeting, so it wasn’t as hectic of an afternoon as it could have been.

I was a disaster this morning. I woke up and promptly had an asthma attack, which was not pleasant. Once I got that under control, I got dressed... and put my dress on inside out. Like, I almost walked out of the house that way. And I jabbed myself in the eye when I was putting mascara on... I ended up being late to my PLC meeting, but, luckily, I wasn’t the only one. Apparently, it was just that kind of morning.

On the plus side, I managed to get it together by the time I had to teach. I gave a beast of a test in APUSGOV, which was quite revealing about students’ study habits. I think that success on these tests takes more studying- or more efficient studying- than a lot of them are used to, and some are struggling to figure out how to address that. They can retake tests, of course, but I’m also going to take some time to suggest some strategies and resources to try in preparation for a retake or for the next unit test, and invite students to come see me to work one-on-one as needed. 

During World/English, Mrs. T and I spent the bulk of our time checking outlines and reading rough drafts of book papers, and the rest of our time walking around the Cavern to keep on eye on students’ progress. And, oh man, there was some awesome progress today. One of our students, who struggles with reading and probably hadn’t read a full book in years, finished his book today. That’s HUGE! Another thing: remember me writing a few days ago that there was one student refusing to do any work? I showed her and one of her friends how to set up Snap and Read to read the book out loud to them as they followed along, and today they asked if they could go down to the quiet room in the Vice Principal’s office to keep using it. An hour later, when I went to check on them, they were both in the middle of taking notes. Mrs. T and I are both thrilled about that.

A bunch of my APUSGOV students are interning/volunteering on different presidential campaigns, which is totally awesome, and I’m SO grateful to all the staffers who have encouraged and empowered them. But, sometimes, it leads to some funny moments in class. Like, this morning, I caught a few of the students who work for Pete Buttigieg sneaking campaign lit to their classmates (clearly, it wasn’t actually very sneaky) in an effort to get a few more commits, so I texted the local field organizer to tell him the hustle is real.

I think it’s great, though. 

Meantime, the actual lesson I was teaching was about how bills become laws (or not). I got to make use of the entire Cavern of Learning, too, since Mrs. T doesn’t have a class that block. I gave students a set of questions about the legislative process, and taped the answers all over the room, so they literally had to walk through the process. They also identified all the ways a bill can be “killed.” It’s a good lesson, and it’s a bit different than what they’re used to doing, so it’s fun. I wandered around and fielded questions as they came up (lots about Senate procedure because Senate procedure is awesomely weird). I misspoke at one point, and realized it after class had ended, so I Remind texted a correction to everyone. 

Ahh, modern teaching...

And, all though I used the whole Cavern for APUSGOV, Mrs. T and I actually taught World and English separately today. In World, students had to take a content quiz and then could use the remainder of class to revise their book papers. In English, Mrs. T assigned the next part of this sequence- the research project- and went over how to give an effective project presentation, and then had students choose topics (they can choose anything that was addressed in the books they just read) and start research. On the next set of A-B days, we’ll reopen the wall between our classrooms so we can both be available to help students with their projects. 

Today, for the first time in APUSGOV history, I had a guest speaker scheduled (one of Joe Biden’s staffers) and he didn’t show up!

Campaigns are hectic, so I assume something came up. Or I wrote down the wrong date. Or who knows what. 

It ended up being a good thing, though, because I went on with my lecture about how presidential campaigns work, and my students had waaaaay more questions than I’d thought they would. I wouldn’t have gotten to all of them if I’d had less time. A few of their questions stumped me- like, they wanted to know way more than I knew about faithless electors- so after class I sent them a Remind text with links to more info. Also, I think I’m going to start next class with an opportunity for Q&A just in case there are still things kids want to know. I love that they’re so curious, and I love and hate that sometimes they ask me questions I can’t answer off the top of my head. It’s challenging, and energizing, and really, really fun.

I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again: I am so glad I get to teach that class.

Mrs. T and I still have our World/English classes combined, and while the last lesson was mostly mine to teach, this one was mostly hers. Before we opened the wall between our classrooms to make our Cavern of Learning, she was teaching our students the basics of narrative scene-writing, so first she reviewed that. Then, she and the students marked up an example narrative from one of our former students, and then she laid out the instructions for the narrative we’re assigning: a fact-based fictional narrative based on anything I’ve taught about Latin America. I stepped in at that point to help students brainstorm and create a list of story ideas. Then their task was to pick one, go back over my course materials for useful information, and do some additional research in order to have enough detail to write a good story.

What are some students planning to write about? Hiking up Machu Picchu, preparing for Dia de Los Muertos, Andres Escobar’s death, the protests in Venezuela, the violence in the Northern Triangle, the Sandinistas, learning capoeira, celebrating Carnavale... I love the variety of ideas, and the enthusiasm for them. It was really neat to listen to students talk about what they’re planning to write. 

A bunch of them came in during flex time to make up work, or keep doing research. A few of my APUSGOV students came in to, either to go over their recent unit test prior to retaking it, or to do the retake. The most adorable thing happened when a few of the freshmen boys, who’d finished the work they owed me and were watching something on Youtube and discussing it a bit loudly, realized the girl next to them was taking a test; their eyes went wide, and they immediately and simultaneously whispered “Sorry!” and kept their voices low for the rest of the block. 

Students returned after a 3.5-day weekend (early release and teacher workshop day for us), and dug into the lesson Mrs. T and I did in our Cavern of Learning. It’s the same one I wrote about last week, but it went a lot more smoothly today because classes were regular length. Not many students ended up with homework; some were finished before lunch, even, and had time to study or work on other things, which is cool.

I’m fairly pleased with the whole lesson, but I think the video clips the students watched were particularly useful for teaching them about current events. I’ve written before that they like watching videos on the laptops because they can hit pause, and re-watch parts, and so on- so I’m basically asking them to do what they do constantly on Youtube, just for an academic purpose, and it works. The thing I want to change up for next time is the info hunt because several students rushed through it, and I don’t think a lot of the info actually stuck. They’ll be able to recover that, though, because next class Mrs. T is going to have them do further research in preparation for writing narratives. 

Both of us spent Block 5 preparing for next class: setting up presentation materials, printing research note-taking sheets and graphic organizers, moving tables around, discussing our sequence. Then I did a bunch of grading so our students can get all their assignments from today back to refer to next class. A former student stopped by briefly to chat while I was doing that, so I was able to take a little break and discuss homework, volleyball, traveling to other countries, and other things.