Contextual Factors: Description of Students

Contextual Factors

Description of Students:

            The class I will be teaching is comprised of 33 6^th graders.  There are 13 girls and 20 boys.  Looking at the class, there are what appear to be 6 Hispanic students, 1 African-American student, and the remainder of the students White.  These numbers are based on a combination of observation and last name.  This mixture of student ethnicity is very close to the mixture officially reported for the school as a whole. 

In the class, three of the students in the class have been identified as Talented and Gifted (TAG) and seven are on Individual Education Plans (IEPs) for various reasons.  Two of the students that have been identified as TAG have been identified for reading and the other student has been identified as TAG for both reading and math.  The students that are on IEPs have accommodations and modifications in their IEPs for reading, written language, math, study skills, communication, study skills, and behavior.  One of the students is also receiving services for autism.  Most of the accommodations are simply allowing more time for reading and writing tasks and for preferred seating.  For my teaching, the impact is that I will have to arrange the class schedule to allow for the additional time required by the IEPs as well as have extensions available for the TAG students to prevent them from being bored.

In the class there are seven students that have been identified as English Language Learners (ELL).  Six of them are speak Spanish as their first language and one speaks Marshallese as his or her first language.  For the classroom, I will need to become aware of how fluent they are.  I will also be careful to check for understanding frequently and to define the terms I use carefully.  Test questions will also need to be carefully phrased and I will make it clear to students that they can ask if they do not understand the question.  Additionally, communication with families will likely require translation services because if the students in the classroom are identified ELL then the possibility is good that the parents are, also.

Overall, it is a very challenging classroom with a wide range of needs, skills, and backgrounds.  As a teacher, I will need to work very hard to meet the needs of all of my students.  I will have a wide range of skills and backgrounds to draw upon in the class to help to meet those needs.  Each of the students bring something unique that can be used to enrich the classroom experience.

Contextual Factors: Description of Classroom

Contextual Factors

Description of Classroom:

            The classroom that I will be teaching in is a small science classroom.  The students sit at small tables, which are pushed together into pairs to create three rows.  Due to space constraints, one of the tables is turned ninety degrees at the left side of the classroom and the two students at that table face into the room.  This creates one row down the center of the room and there is some space around the tables to reach the counter that runs around the room.  Access to the four students that sit in the center of the middle row of tables is a little restricted.  This seating arrangement focuses student attention toward the front of the room during teacher led instruction but allows for easy transition to group work.  For my teaching, this means that I will have to allow for some time and disruption when moving to group work but it should help to minimize some of the issues that I could have with classroom management having the students facing each other if they were sitting in groups of four which would be the only other possible arrangement of the tables due to space constraints.

            In the front of the classroom there is a demonstration bench, white board, and projector screen.  The entry to the room is in the front corner so as you enter the presentation bench is directly in front of you and the student seating is to the left.  The teacher’s desk is in the corner, facing the students, in the other front corner.  Along the side and back walls is a counter top with sinks for doing the laboratory work that occurs in a science class.

            Due to space constraints, there are only two ways for this classroom to be set up.  The tables can be arranged as they are, seating the students in groups of four, or they can be set up in rows across the classroom so that the students sit side by side and face toward the front of the room.  The space is constrained because of the large number of desks required to seat all of the students.  With the additional 100 students that are present now that BMS is a school of choice, class sizes have grown proportionately and have begun to limit the options teachers have in arranging their classroom. 

The current seating arrangement fits my supervising teacher’s style of instruction.  In the short time that I have observed him teaching he has never had the students discuss among themselves any of the topics or ideas that have been presented in class and all of the interaction in the classroom has been between student and teacher. 

The room is also about as welcoming and stimulating as it can be.  There simply is not very much wall space when the windows, whiteboard, and storage cabinets are taken into account.  There are a few posters and items around the room to get students asking questions.  My overall impression is that the room feels pretty neutral to students.  It does not draw them in nor push them away.  It also doesn’t distract them with too much going on but neither is it particularly enriching.

Overall, the impact the room and its arrangement has for my teaching is that I will need to plan in time for change-over to group work.  Also, with the forward direction of the attention created by the seating arrangement, getting student to student response during discussion will be more difficult because none of them are facing each other.  Finally, for lab work, I will have to structure the location of lab materials and how the labs are done to account for the lack of mobility around the room with everyone up and moving.  For example, arranging the materials into stations and then having the students switch on a timer might be a way to manage the movement of students.

Contextual Factors: Description of School

Description of School:

Located in south of Salem, BMS draws from a wide spectrum of socio-economic groups.  According to the Oregon Department of Education (ODE), BMS has 40.3% of its students eligible for free and reduced lunch.  In comparison, the school district has 58.0% of its students eligible for free and reduced lunch.  While BMS would appear to have less of its students impoverished based on these numbers compared to the rest of the district, these numbers do imply that many of the students will be dealing with the factors that accompany issues of poverty and homelessness.  These factors include, but are not limited to, hunger, the lack of resources for supplies, and the lack of resources for use at home such as access to the internet.  For my classroom, I have been thinking about what I can expect students to be able to do at home or bring in to use because of the lack of resources. 

            According to the Oregon Department of Education, as of the 2009-2010 school year, of the 804 students at BMS, 20.7% minority students.  This is a significantly lower percentage than the 46.6% for the district and 31.6% for the state.  12.9% of the minority students are Hispanic, 2.8%Asian-Pacific Islander, 0.4% Black, 1.7% American Indian/Alaskan Native, and 2.8% Multi-ethnic.  Its student population was made up of According to the 2009-2010 School Report Card only 2.5% of BMS students were in ESL programs compared to 16.1% for the district and 10.3% for the state.  This is a significantly lower number than for the rest of the district but I think that makes it even more important, as a teacher, to look for the ESL students in my classroom.  It could be very easy to assume that there are not any of these students in my classroom and I want to make sure that I provide the best education that I can for all of my students.  I also want to be aware of the minority students and the assets they bring to the classroom.

The BMS staff consists of 48 teachers, 16 instructional assistants, 5 deaf and hard of hearing interpreters, 2 counselors, 1 principal and 1 assistant principal, a librarian and an assistant, and 16 support staff.  The demographics of the staff is predominantly White and about an even mixture of male and female.  The only three non-White members of the staff that I can recall observing are the custodian, one of the Spanish teachers, and one of the counselors.  The principal is male and the assistant principal is female.  The office staff is entirely female.  Even with the student demographics being weighted more toward White than the district in general, the staff of BMS is not representative of the students.  The image that having the only three Hispanic, and non-white, staff members playing the roles that they play in the school may leave a significant impact on the multi-cultural students.  I think it would be good for the students of color to have representatives of other races among the teaching staff.

The school has, under the rules set down by the No Child Left Behind Act, become a school of choice.  Because of this, BMS has experienced a rise in enrollment of approximately 100 students over last year.  The approximately 14% increase in enrollment has had a noticeable effect on school culture and class size.  That means that every class of 30 students suddenly has 34-35 students in it.  From discussions with teachers it is clear that it is taking some time for these students to make friends and to begin to identify with the school as a whole. 

Contextual Factors: Description of Community

 Blah Middle School (BMS) is located in Salem, Oregon.  According to the City of Salem website, as of 2009, Salem, Oregon had a population of approximately 156,690 and an unemployment rate of 12.0%.  According to the US Census Bureau, Salem’s employment profile is weighted toward Health Care and Social Assistance, Accommodation and Food Services, Retail, Trade, Manufacturing, and Construction.  These six categories make up about half of the employment opportunities for the residents of Salem.  The employment opportunities are a mixture of blue-collar and white-collar jobs.  This implies that there will be a broad spectrum of education levels among students’ parents.  The impact this has for teaching and learning is that there will be some differences in how education is valued and potentially in how much support the students have at home to help them with their work.

If you drive around the city of Salem you will notice what I refer to as neighborhood segregation.  There are some neighborhoods where the houses and yards are well cared for and some where they are not.  Different ethnic and racial groups appear to self-segregate into neighborhoods.  I find it interesting that the neighborhoods are, generally, fairly small in geographic extent, and will change over every few blocks.  The implication of this for teaching and learning is that, due to the neighborhood size, the schools in Salem are relatively diverse but, depending where the school boundaries are drawn, some schools become weighted toward certain ethnic and socio-economic groups.

BMS is located in south Salem, to the south and west of the main roads in south Salem and it is among relatively new housing developments.  It is near the edge of town, with almost no development to the south.  Being at the edge of town, BMS primarily draws upon students from an urban environment but there are a number of students from homes that are more rural in setting but have ready access to the resources of a city nearby.  I think that this type of diversity is somewhat unusual, having a school with rural and urban students, and teachers will need to be aware of how there may be different values and experiences between these two groups.

According to the 2006-2008 American Community Survey 3-Year Estimates from the US Census Bureau, Salem, Oregon is 17.9% Latino or Hispanic, 1.4% Black or African-American, 3.0% Alaskan Native or American Indian, 2.6% Asian, 0.7% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander, 4.3% some other race, 3.3% two or more races, and 84.7% White.  The implication of this for education is that teachers can expect to have a significant Latino or Hispanic population in their schools, as well as mixture of races.  This will potentially result in a large number of students who speak Spanish, or another language, as their native language as well as parents that may or may not speak English. 

Reflection 4.1 -- Reactions to different kinds of students

This is not an easy reflection for me.  The only experiences that I have in the classroom in the teacher role are from this program so I can only conjecture as to students that will fit these categories.  I do think that I should come back to this later, when I've been teaching for a while, and see how it compares to reality.

Kids you find it easy to like: 
I find it easy to like kids who have an easy smile, who are respectful, and who are interested in what is going on in class. These are the kids that let you in and are ready and willing to interact with me.

Kids you find it hard to like:
The kids for this are really the ones who won't let you in.  The kids who don't want to try.  The kids who are disrespectful, both to themselves and to others.

Kids you are sorry for:
The kids who fall under this category are the ones that have challenges that are out of their control.  Examples are things like homelessness, poverty, "home issues", and things like learning disabilities.  Students have enough work to do and enough challenges in their lives that they don't need extra things to make it more difficult.

Kids you feel threatened by:
I don't think that there are any kids that I will feel threatened by.  I suppose, if I were in a really hard school, then I might be worried about personal safety.  Hard school being one that has a history of violence.

Kids you identify with:
These kids will be much like the ones that I find easy to like.  I was one of the students that was respectful and interested.  I did my work, on time, and to the best of my abilities.

Kids you gravitate toward:
Hard for me to differentiate, again, between this and the kids that I find it easy to like and identify with.  I do think that, to some extent, that I will also gravitate towards the ones that are being more challenged by the class to try to give them the extra support to help them succeed.

Kids you feel inadequate around:
The ones that I think that I'll feel inadequate around are going to be the ones that I can't figure out what to do with.  Kids that have learning or developmental issues that I don't really know how to reach or relate to. 

Kids you probably don't even notice:
I hope that there won't be any kids that I won't notice.  I suppose that some of the quiet, unassuming kids that are doing well in the class might fly under the radar a bit.  They won't need any extra help, but with the numbers of kids it might be hard for me to go out of my way to seek them out, if nothing else but because of the demands on my time by the other kids.

Chapter 3 Interview and Reflection

I choose to interview a middle school girl for Reflection 3.11.  I wanted to get a perspective as far from my own as I could.  I'll admit to putting this assignment off to the last minute and, with the discussion about the differences between adolescent boys and girls in Ed Psych today this idea felt even better to me.  I really wanted to get a female adolescent perspective on the influence of teachers.  Just to preface her answers, I did NOT expect the answers that I got.

For this reflection, these were "complete the sentence" interview questions:

If I were repeatedly ignored, I would... go up to the teacher after class and talk to him/her.

If I often received praised for mediocre work, I would... feel okay about it still.

If I were constantly reprimanded, although I did nothing wrong, I would... go up to the teacher after class and talk to him/her.

Before I talk about what I learned from this, I have to say.  The way the questions were asked they had to be rephrased for the student.  She didn't understand when explained and read the statement to her. 

So, I was very surprised by the maturity of the responses for the first and last statements.  I expected much more internalization and less problem solving.  I expected her to express some kind of feelings about how the teacher was treating her and, even with some leading, I couldn't get any more out of her.

I was less surprised about her accepting the praise for mediocre work.  She was very hesitant about this response but again, when asked, did not elaborate.  I think that, because it was positive feedback, that was better than negative feedback so she didn't really want to mess with what was a better situation than being told she wasn't doing well.  Now, I realize that is reading a lot into how she answered and I may be stretching her tone and hesitancy further than I should.

Achievement

a·chieve·ment

 /əˈtʃivmənt/ Show Spelled[uh-cheev-muhnt] Show IPA

–noun

1.

something accomplished, esp. by superior ability, special effort, great courage, etc.; a great or heroic deed: his remarkable achievements in art.

2.

act of achieving; attainment or accomplishment: the achievement of one's object.

While that is the dictionary.com definition, I have never thought of achievement as implying great things.  I've always viewed it much more as the secondary definition of attaining one's object.  If you've ever seen the movie "What about Bob?" with Bill Murray, I like "baby steps".  This leads into my three "favorite" characteristics of achievements.  

First, achievement is personal.  It is not an achievement if the person doing it doesn't view it as such.  For me, getting my homework done in time for class is not an achievement.  Remembering everyone's name in class is much more so because for me, it was a challenge.  Not to say that the homework is not a challenge but, for me, because it is a requirement of the course it is not personal.

Second, achievement does not come easily.  Again, I am poor at names, so remembering everyone's name is an achievement for me.  It is also personal.  The difficulty is personal to me but that challenge may not be recognized by someone else.

Finally, achievement is about bettering yourself.  To keep with the remembering of names, I recognize that I need to get better at learning people's names.  I need to practice doing so.  Next time, learning 32 names won't really be much of an achievement for me.  Working to remember more and more peoples names will be.  I think you have to raise the bar on your own achievements.

A Brief History of Me

I have to start my blog with an disclaimer,  not for what I'm going to say, but for how I'm going to say it.  For me to properly illustrate one of the influences in my life growing up I'm going to have to use language that some might find offensive.  I understand how offensive this term can be but I view terms like this as part of history.  Not just my history, but the shared history of how cultures have struggled with coming together in this country.  I would never use it with the intent to cause injury.  That being said, I'll begin. 

           My life started and for the first 22 years was completely centered in Springfield, Oregon.  I was born at McKenzie-Willamette hospital December 10^th, 1975.  My parents had bought their house in Springfield a few years before I was born and they still live in that house today.  Springfield is largely the blue collar, conservative step-brother of Eugene which is much more diverse politically and economically.  My parents, for reasons that I’ve never really understood, only ever took us to Eugene to go to REI or to the mall.  I think my parents were afraid of the cultural mix, of the “hippies”.  Any cultural or ethnic diversity that would have been available to me through Eugene was left untapped.

My father has worked for the same plywood mill in Springfield since before I was born.  My mother works for an insurance agency in a middle management role.  She has also never "switched" jobs though the company that she started working for has been bought and her role has changed as the companies have evolved.  I have never encountered anyone who has had a more stable childhood with respect to moving and parental jobs.

I am the oldest son of three sons.  My brothers are 3yrs and 4.5yrs younger than I am.  It's been said that I spoiled my parents by being an unusually easy child to raise and that they weren't prepared when my brother's were born.  Once I was old enough I was the “babysitter”.  My parents just didn’t make enough money to hire one easily so I had to take on some extra responsibility early. 

Religion, in my past, needs to be addressed.  I was raised Catholic and spent the first 7 years of my education in private Catholic schools.  I even had a nun as a teacher for third grade.  I was an alter server and was pulled out of class regularly in grade school for masses and funerals.  I no longer consider myself Catholic, or even particularly religious, but Catholic values have had a very large effect on my value system today. 

Growing up in the town and going to the schools I did, my multicultural exposure was very minimal.  At the private grade school I attended, there was only one student that wasn’t white.  Through 5^th grade, the socio-economic status of the people I was with was also very similar.  We were all lower-middle class.  During 6^th grade I attended a very rich private school and was “the poor kid”.  This was not a pleasant experience and I was very much the outsider.  My memory is that every other student in my class had a lawyer, a doctor, or a dentist as one of their parents.  It took me half of the school year to break down the barriers between me and the other students.  This was the only time in my life that I had not been readily accepted into my peer group.  It was not an experience that I would like to repeat.

Even when I began to attend public school in 7^th grade, there wasn’t any more racial diversity.  I can’t remember anyone in my classes in middle school that was not white.  High school was a little more diverse, but not by much.  There was a small group of Hispanic kids but they formed their own little clique.  There was also a family of African-American boys, but I didn’t know them well.  I played football with Germaine but he ran with a very different crowd than I did.  We got along, but I wouldn’t call him a friend.

With that kind of history, I obviously grew up on the white kid side of the fence.  I remember complaining with my friends in high school while we were looking for scholarships to go to college that it wasn’t fair.  There were hundreds of scholarships for people of different races but there seemed to be few scholarships for those of us who were not minorities.  My parents, and the parents of my friends, made just enough money to mess up our financial aid but not enough to help with tuition in any meaningful fashion. 

My mother’s father was a racist.  We lived fairly close to my grandparents and we saw them pretty often.  I have a vivid memory of my grandfather asking one of my cousins “How’s your nigger girlfriend?”.  The strangest thing about it was that he said it with so little feeling.  It was just how someone with darker skin was described.  My cousin took it in stride, by the way.  We were used to grandpa.

College for me was a blur.  I competed in Track & Field at the University of Oregon.  I threw shotput, discus, and hammer.  Track & Field is a very divided sport which, for the most part, the throwers hang out with the throwers, the sprinters with sprinters, and so on.  On top of that, I worked all the way through college, in the evenings and on weekends, while carrying a full time load so I simply didn’t have a lot of time to socialize and try to break down those barriers.

Somehow, I came out of this white, blue collar, racist influenced childhood very accepting of other cultures.  I think it was mostly the “negative” response factor.  I did NOT want to be like my grandfather.  I did not want to be afraid of other cultures.  I did not want to exclude people as I was excluded that one year in school.

Chapter 1 Reflections

Working through the reflections in chapter one was very interesting.  There were a couple things that I learned about myself that I think were pretty important.

Probably the most important thing I learned was that I've not thought at all about needing something to "sustain" me as a teacher.  While I am entering the profession with many of the idealistic principles that a lot of people become teachers with I am also aware that teaching is going to be a lot of work.  That it is a largely thankless job, unrecognized by most students and much of society for both it's difficulty and it's value as a profession.  What I do think will sustain me, having thought about it further, as a parent and a non-traditional student, is that I realize how much I value a quality education and I want to have the ability to give that opportunity to students.

The other thing that I learned about myself doing the reflections is that my life has been rather disconnected from multicultural issues.  The statements by Dale Spender and Sojourner Truth were difficult to understand.  Honestly, that puts me firmly with Spender's first line of "Our problem had not been perceived as a problem...".  My education has been such to give, at the least, the perception that the issues of feminism have been largely dealt with and I have not had the need or opportunity to challenge that perception.  The quote from Sojourner Truth, in my struggle with figuring out what she's trying to say, supports my realization that I have more to learn about feminist issues.  I'm still not sure what she was trying to say.