Seriously...where is the closest beach?

First things first - immediate apologies to all of our loyal fans (thanks mom) for the severe posting lapse. We have been doing much of the same: settling into our new space (see post below), learning how to be a teacher, looking for jobs, finding the best laundromat, buying groceries, etc. We have found Denver, and specifically our neighborhood of Capital Hill, to be very pleasant and welcoming.

Recently we have shared heart warming human interest stories about moving, Sophie the cat, our apartment, Mexican food, etc. I think today is an appropriate time for an achievement gap update. It is a bit of a delicate task to publicly illuminate the systemic problems of American public schools when I: 1. Have only recently been a part of this bureaucratic organization, and 2. Am actually employed by said organization.


Why I Write
A purpose that I have for this blog is for friends, family, and those who happen to google "Teach for America, Denver Public Schools, Achievement Gap, etc.", to be able to see a glimpse of the injustice that children in poverty, and specifically minority children of poverty, face every day. What we are up against is a culture of low expectations, a misaligned pedagogy that labels students as lazy (or dumb, or slow, or too far behind), and disproportionate challenges to learning outside of school. While I cannot change a child's home life, the realization of overcrowded homes, absent fathers, video games in lieu of books and after school sports, malnutrition, and abuse are all factors that prevent my students from achieving at the level that my classmates and I did in school.

Back to the delicacy of this blog. While I want to be candid about my experiences, this is a public forum. Even though no one reads it, this is still public. That kind of begs the question of the tree falling in the forest....but I digress.

I am an employee of DPS, of Rachel B. Noel Middle School, and I am entrusted with the lives of 200 students. With that in mind, I will share funny stories, atrocities, tearjerkers , and knee slappers. However, this will not become a rant, a place to complain about work and my employer, or a place to humiliate my students. My students will, undoubtedly, read this blog when they google "layne madden". Not that I will not talk about my students. They absolutely deserve to have their stories told, but stories will be anonymous, or pseudnymonous . It is morally incumbent on me to share the injustice that I see, but only in a way that maintains the dignity of the 11-14 yearolds whom I have been entrusted with.


My Assignment
I can only speak to my experience as a first year teacher, but I encourage the veterans to comment to this point. From what I understand, this is not a situation unique to Denver Public Schools, but is the modus operandi for back to school preparation. Here's the story:

When I was hired, in early June, I was told that I would be most likely teaching 7th and 8th grade. During the time that I was at institute in Atlanta, however, the administration team that was at RBN (rachel b noel) was replaced by a new team. As could be expected, the transition between the two teams meant that my assignment was again undecided. Because the new team brought with them new priorities and perspectives, the schedule needed to be changed.

Teach for America, ever on the forefront of planning ahead, began guiding me through the process of developing my Learning Goals (assessment objectives, tested standards, _____insert your own educational buzzword here), assessments, long term plan, and first unit plan. Even though my assignment was uncertain, I chose to plan for 7th grade life science. I spent hours breaking down the standards into objectives, determining all of the skills that my students would need to have by May, re-writing assessments to fit into my long term plan, and planning out what would happen every day of the first unit. I was pretty proud of the work that I had accomplished, and felt prepared to begin teaching life science.

Flash forward to last Thursday. This is when I found out I would not be teaching 7th grade life science, but I would be teaching 6th and 8th grade Earth and Physical science. Frustrating, yes, but I do not fault our administration team. I am actually quite impressed at how quickly they worked to implement all of the changes that they wanted to make. I don't fault the district for the late transition. I believe that there is a fundamental problem with how this whole teaching profession is viewed. I am given 13 days to prepare to teach a year of earth science AND a year of physical science. I have never taught before.


What is expected:
Trust the curriculum. Even if you don't know what you want your students to be able to do by the end of the year, just trust the curriculum, it will get them there. It was designed by experts in their field, it is full of hands-on activities that will engage the students in learning, it is used by everyone in the district, so just trust it. There is no expectation that I would write a long term plan for the year. No one expects that I would even have my first unit planned out. Does the curriculum diagnose, pace, differentiate, remediate, discipline, build respect, encourage, challenge, or call home?


Comments:
I have written enough today, and I need to respect everyone's attention span. I would love to hear comments about "what is expected". What is so wrong with giving a first year teacher the curriculum and saying trust it (btw, I actually haven't even been given the curriculum yet)? Why do teachers pay tens of thousands of dollars to get Master's degrees in education when all that is needed is to trust the curriculum?