tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19077025378840897182024-02-23T00:03:39.749-08:00Exit 10ATrying to make meaning.Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.comBlogger151125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-77038640209427711672021-02-09T17:48:00.000-08:002021-02-09T17:48:07.128-08:00First Lessons<p> My first year teaching was both the most difficult and the most exciting of my career. The workload was staggering and the learning curve was steep, but every day was a new adventure and the thrill of finally having my own class took a long time to wear off. Looking back, I'm not sure who learned more, me or my students. Here are three valuable lessons from year one: </p><p><b>I. The Gym Teacher</b></p><div style="text-align: left;"> Mr E, the gym teacher, was on the back nine of his career. When I first met him he seemed hard-edged, like something bad had happened to him in his past that he couldn't quite get over and was still bitter about. His size didn't help; he was a barrel-chested 6'4", 250 lbs, so he cut quite an intimidating figure. I didn't have much interaction with him, just dropping my class off for gym and picking them up, all hot and sweaty, 40 minutes later.<br /> One day, early in the year, a kid came back to the room from gym class in tears. Mr E, she said, had yelled at her. I could believe it-- I had occasionally heard his voice boom out from the all-purpose room as I walked to and from the office. She said she was scared of him and didn't want to go back to gym class. I tried to console her, but she was adamant. She did not want to go back to gym.<br /> What to do? <br /> At that point in my couple-of-months teaching career, the person I felt most comfortable with was my principal. He had hired me, he was incredibly supportive, and he had told me to feel free to come to him with any problems, that his door was always open. And, to be honest, I was also a little scared of Mr E. So I told my principal what had happened, and he told me he would take care of it. Rookie mistake. You can guess what happened next. <br /> The next day Mr E cornered me. Have you seen the episode of The Office when Stanley yells at Ryan? That's kind of what happened. He got up close, and respectfully but forcefully explained that if there was a problem I should have come to him directly. I told him I understood, and that it wouldn't happen again.<br /><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Lesson</b>: <b>If you have an issue with a colleague, go to the colleague first. Don't run to the principal every time you have a problem.<br /></b><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;">Addendum: <br /> Mr E was still teaching gym some years later when I became our school's union rep. (I guess he decided to play 27 holes.) In the interim I had gotten to know him a little better. (Did he remember what had taken place between us? After that day we had never spoken about it.) In the middle of some very contentious contract negotiations, each rep was tasked with organizing their building's staff for a job action. I knew this would be difficult, as we had several staff members who were skeptical, if not outrightly hostile. Although I had prepared a rousing call to action, including a call-back to the time, only a few years prior, when district teachers were jailed for going on strike for the better wages and working conditions that the current staff was enjoying, I was afraid that there might be an exodus during the presentation. Whether or not they ultimately supported the job action was their decision, but they were darn well going to listen to what I had to say. So I asked Mr E to stand by the closed faculty room door. He filled up practically the entire frame, and stood there for the entire meeting with his arms folded against his chest. If anyone was going to leave, they were going to have to get by him. No one left. Thanks, Mr E! </div><p><b>II. The Messy Desk </b></p><p><b> </b>Nathan was one of those kids who could never seem to pull it all together. Think Pigpen from the Peanuts comic. Shoelaces untied, breakfast all over his shirt, nose constantly running. It wasn't a matter of neglect; he came from a very loving and attentive family. He was just one of those happy-go-lucky kids who always seemed one or two beats off. </p><p> His desk was a reflection of his personality. I mean it was a total disaster area. No matter how many times I made him clean and organize it, it instantaneously reverted back to its natural state. Everything was just jammed in there: textbooks, notebooks, stray worksheets from months back, crumpled old tests never taken home to be signed, broken pencils, crushed crayon boxes, dried out markers with no caps, weeks-old half-eaten snacks, little toys... that was Nathan's desk. </p><p> (This was the opposite of Amanda's desk, meticulously organized with every single thing in its exact place. She loved to color, and had one of those big boxes of Crayolas, one of those 64 packs. One day I noticed that, while most of the crayons were worn down, there were a few select colors that hadn't been touched, their points still sharp. I asked her why she didn't use them, and she told me that they were her favorite colors, and she didn't want to wear them out. I've never met a kid with so much willpower!) </p><p> Anyway, back to Nathan. What infuriated me most was how long it took him to find something. Waiting for him to excavate his math message book from his desk was like waiting for Godot-- and meanwhile my lesson was being held up. And then once he found it, forget about finding a pencil to write with. One day I lost it. After waiting for what seemed like an eternity for him to get what he needed to start the lesson, I stormed over to his desk and just tipped it over. No words. Everything in the desk came crashing down onto the floor. The class froze. Nathan looked down at the pile of rubble, looked up at me, and burst into tears. I immediately understood that I had screwed up. I publicly apologized, and believe I was able to repair my relationship with Nathan, but I've <i>never</i> forgotten the look on his face. </p><p><b>Lesson: Never embarrass a student.</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><b>III. The Candy Thief</b></p><div style="text-align: left;"><b> </b>One afternoon, craving a treat, I opened my bottom desk drawer intending to dip into my hidden supply of candy. (Yes, I have a secret sweet tooth.) Imagine my surprise when I found that an entire bag of Halloween candy had disappeared. I was crushed. I took it personally. One of the kids in my class was a thief and had no compunction about stealing something from me. What had I done to deserve it?<br /> I gathered the class together and said all the usual things you might say in that situation: Confess and you won't get in trouble; it's more important to tell the truth; whoever did it can talk to me privately and no one else will know, etc. Didn't work. No one came forward, either to admit to the deed or to rat someone out. The case remained open. For the rest of the year it bothered me knowing that there was a kid in my class that would steal something out of my desk. Who was it? <br /> Fast forward about 10 years. I come into school one spring morning and find a note on my desk. It's from a former student, Damien. I don't have the note, but I'll paraphrase:</div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i>Dear Mr. Schwartz,<br /></i><i> You may not remember me, but I was a student in your second grade class. I'm a senior in high school now and am going to graduate next month. I just want you to know that it was me who stole the candy, and I'm very sorry that I did that.<br /></i><i> Signed,<br /></i><i> Damien</i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i> </i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i> </i>Damien!?! Of course I remembered Damien! So he was the culprit! And he'd been carrying this guilt around all these years. What caused him to finally come clean? I sent a note back to him through inter-district mail, saying of course I remembered him, thanking him for his apology, letting him know that I though it was a courageous act, and wishing him well in his post-HS endeavors.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b>Lesson: Who your students are now are not who they'll always be.</b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b> </b>The events described above happened 35 years ago, as far away from a first year teacher today as someone who taught in 1951 was from me my first year. Looking back, I'm not completely sure that I would've thought someone from 1951 would've had anything to teach me about teaching. I was young and full of myself. Wasn't I up on all the latest trends? Hadn't education changed dramatically from 1951 to 1986? </div><div style="text-align: left;"> Hasn't it changed dramatically from 1986 to 2021? Yes, notions of pedagogy and best practices have changed, and technology has revolutionized many aspects of what we do in the classroom. (My 1986 self had high, middle, and low reading groups reading out of basal readers and completing worksheets I ran off on a ditto machine.) But what hasn't changed, and what will never change, is that our project is a human one. </div><div style="text-align: left;"> A school is more than a building, more than the sum of its chairs and desks and whiteboards and Smart Boards; more than all its books and tests. A school, even a virtual one, is an intersection where lives converge, where our lives, and the lives of our colleagues and our students meet in all their messy, intimate complexity. Yes, I learned a lot in my first year teaching, probably more than my students. How to write lesson plans, how to fill out a report card, how to organize a field trip, how to schedule parent-teacher conferences, how to work the copy machine. But the most important lessons were the ones that taught me how to be a better human being. And those lessons are timeless. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuXggZx-hULh7H-YmnKHtqgoWQcDVEsnz8hSy8bL_7pBeyTI_cgN6k_54ofkHmVIuehCzWE8mQLyvVK-OpBDvdXA-4Ffu5cegsodD9MLc2FdZGHaVRiQ2Y9HLGhBogLdqUSjqcwfTAMEM/s1542/class+pic.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1148" data-original-width="1542" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuXggZx-hULh7H-YmnKHtqgoWQcDVEsnz8hSy8bL_7pBeyTI_cgN6k_54ofkHmVIuehCzWE8mQLyvVK-OpBDvdXA-4Ffu5cegsodD9MLc2FdZGHaVRiQ2Y9HLGhBogLdqUSjqcwfTAMEM/w363-h270/class+pic.png" width="363" /></a></div><br /> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> <i> </i></div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><b> </b></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-81366517167855326972021-01-26T11:39:00.000-08:002021-01-26T11:39:04.546-08:00Rooting For the Laundry<p> Ricky F. was one of my very first students. He was a bit undersized for a second grader, but more than made up for it with his boundless enthusiasm and energy. As an NFL draft expert would say, the kid had a motor. He also had a love of baseball and an intense dedication to the Chicago Cubs.</p><p> Chicago Cubs fans are not easy to find here in central New Jersey, where we straddle the line between Philadelphia and New York. We've got Phillies, Yankees, and a smattering of Mets supporters, but Cubs fans are few and far between. So naturally I was curious. Why was Ricky a Cubs fan? Did his family have Chicago roots? Was Cubs fandom an ancestral heritage? Was his Little League team the Cubs? I had to know.</p><p> Turns out he was at home sick one day and by chance tuned into an afternoon Cubs game on superstation WGN. On the mound for the Cubs was a portly pitcher with the same first name as him: Rick Reuschel. That's it. That's all it took for him to become a fan of the Chicago Cubs. He knew nothing of their storied history, none of the famous players who had worn the uniform, or anything about their iconic ballpark. (He also didn't know that the Cubs were the poster franchise for disappointment and failure-- they hadn't won a World Series since 1908. If he had, he might've thought twice.) It was simply a matter of fate. He was home one weekday afternoon. The Cubs, the last major league team to install lights at their home park and play night games, still liked to honor tradition by playing weekday day games. In the 1980s, as cable proliferated, WGN fed Cubs games into homes all over the country. The Cubs were in the field and Rick Reuschel was on the mound. He heard his name and the rest was history.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUMk2e5emLE1JGdaTHDcKvk9GXUkntKAIlTxDYbT-yPsdBKfNco5LJxQ7LlhRS1XP3NZsCaG5GS7SoaP1W8V1fAe-JwFNfOQ-S1GJWjgwKv1nfPKypglQ_zKi2QDCc4GykBMQwmHwAKmM/s1006/rr.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1006" data-original-width="794" height="293" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUMk2e5emLE1JGdaTHDcKvk9GXUkntKAIlTxDYbT-yPsdBKfNco5LJxQ7LlhRS1XP3NZsCaG5GS7SoaP1W8V1fAe-JwFNfOQ-S1GJWjgwKv1nfPKypglQ_zKi2QDCc4GykBMQwmHwAKmM/w232-h293/rr.png" width="232" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rick Reuschel</td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;">*</p><p style="text-align: left;"> My New York Yankee fandom is an ancestral heritage. One of my earliest memories is sitting with my dad watching a Yankee game, and my dad pointing to the little black and white TV and saying, "That's Mickey Mantle." The Mick was way beyond his prime, though I was too young to know that at the time. (A lifetime later my dad joined his brother and three of their cousins at Yankee Fantasy Camp, where a broken down, alcohol-soaked Mantle was barely able to wobble onto the field.)</p><p style="text-align: left;"> Mantle had retired before I saw my first game in person-- Tuesday, May 19, 1970. I was in fourth grade, and my dad and my paternal grandfather took me to the old Yankee Stadium to see the Yankees play the Orioles. It was a night game, and the view of the field as we came through the tunnel to our seats in the upper deck--so big, so green, all lit up in the dark Bronx night--took my breath away. I think fell asleep in the seventh inning. The Yankees lost, 5-1. </p><p style="text-align: left;"> They lost a lot when I was a kid. I came of age during what long-timeYankee fans refer to, not without a little lingering PTSD, as the Horace Clarke Years--a roughly ten year stretch from the mid 1960's to the mid 1970's where the team was mired in mediocrity. The one bright spot was centerfielder Bobby Murcer, the heir apparent to Mantle. (The parallels were eerie. Both from Oklahoma, both converted shortstops, both signed by the same scout.) So Murcer became my favorite Yankee. I can remember my dad showing up to my Little League games straight from work, sitting in the stands with one eye on the field and the other on the Wall Street Journal. On the car ride home he would prank me by saying, "Did you hear the Yanks traded Murcer?" For a moment I thought he was telling the truth. With a crushed look and tears welling up I'd turn and say, "Really?" Then he would make up some ridiculous trade that I knew couldn't be true and we would laugh...until it really was true and Murcer really was traded-- to the San Francisco Giants for Bobby Bonds. I was heartbroken and outraged, and threatened to leave the Yankees forever and become a Giants fan. That's when my dad gave me the speech, which in today's terms we'd call the <a href="https://vimeo.com/47283296">"rooting for the laundry" </a>speech. I stuck with them, and soon after they began their late1970s ascendency: a pennant in 1976 and World Series wins in 1977 and 1978. We all sat--my mom and dad, my brother and sister, my grandparents--with our rally caps on rooting for the Yanks through exciting play-off and Series games. Their success was made ever so much sweeter because I had suffered through such lean years. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuPlGab8uF2ARWAh6-tY4kznGxVK0f3p_zZxkdZJPP305MCGCybsIe7Pg8qcZibV-SbkUbisT2ezfneST6CLX7SFllY5klmA3CEVOVBUhD_944-wReg6ih-0LseMjwYFZzA7uwjyhyRmY/s810/bm.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="810" data-original-width="584" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuPlGab8uF2ARWAh6-tY4kznGxVK0f3p_zZxkdZJPP305MCGCybsIe7Pg8qcZibV-SbkUbisT2ezfneST6CLX7SFllY5klmA3CEVOVBUhD_944-wReg6ih-0LseMjwYFZzA7uwjyhyRmY/s320/bm.png" /></a></div><p style="text-align: center;">*</p><p style="text-align: left;"> My daughter inherited her NY Football Giants fandom from me; I inherited it from my maternal grandfather. He waxed nostalgic about Frank Gifford, Sam Huff, and the glory days of the 1950s; I came of age during the so-called "Wilderness Years", which again made the success the franchise achieved in the mid-to late- 1980s and early 1990s so very sweet and satisfying. She came of age as a fan post- first decade of the 2000s, after the Coughlin Era Super Bowl successes, during what Giants fans are now experiencing as "The Wilderness Years Part 2." Like me with Bobby Murcer, she latched on to what's been the only real bright spot during this time, the electric, controversial wideout Odell Beckham, Jr. She loved his dynamism, his athleticism, his hair and his social media presence. When he was traded to the Cleveland Browns she cried tears of fury and threatened to never watch another Giants game. I trotted out the same speech my dad had given to me-- about how while it's natural to get attached to players, the hard truth is that players come and go, that ultimately you need to stick by your team regardless of who wears the uniform, and that one day they will be good again, and we'll watch them win a Super Bowl together, and all the heartbreak and pain we've experienced watching them lose will make the winning that much sweeter. It took a lot of convincing, and she hates to lose, but she's hanging in there. </p><p style="text-align: left;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgytHZws5MSTcbL912lhqhsfKjAeEyQw7WJZSXTJxpVcax7Urbk8AxvB-Je3BTNZrOpbth4fDy-HwYeEtXossBvYik4hwx6eJ3AkqtOOa63Pj2agMwIXH5LrlbBCoNI6tGZ3E6J_dgILWY/s828/OBJ.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="828" data-original-width="620" height="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgytHZws5MSTcbL912lhqhsfKjAeEyQw7WJZSXTJxpVcax7Urbk8AxvB-Je3BTNZrOpbth4fDy-HwYeEtXossBvYik4hwx6eJ3AkqtOOa63Pj2agMwIXH5LrlbBCoNI6tGZ3E6J_dgILWY/w227-h303/OBJ.png" width="227" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">OBJ</td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: center;">*</p><p style="text-align: left;"> Based on his age at the time he was in my class, I figure that Ricky F. became a Cubs fan in 1984, during Rick Reuschel's second stint with the Cubs. In 1985, the Cubs traded Reuschel to the Pirates. This means that, even after the trade, Ricky remained a Cubs fan. He continued rooting for the laundry. In 2016, the Cubs finally won the World Series, their first in 108 years. (They still hold the streak for longest World Series drought.) I don't know what happened to Ricky F., but I hope he stayed a Cubs fan. I estimate he'd have been in his late thirties on that early November night in 2016 when the Cubs, after being down 3-1, defeated the Cleveland Indians 8-7 in 10 innings in what some consider to be the most dramatic Game 7 ever played. He'd have endured lots of heartbreak in the 30+ years since he first heard his name coming out of the television. I hope he passed down his fandom to his son or daughter, and that they were sharing the sweet moment of victory and vindication with him, just as I hope to share that feeling with my daughter when the Giants win the Super Bowl again. </p><p style="text-align: left;"> If you've ever known that feeling, you know there's nothing like it. </p><p style="text-align: left;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia3L_KE1aNsVs9SFOP5v1wRDzOAYr8YDe0qlPkVrl3P89IEdbOBn0ZrCduPiTWdUn-HJBHhGozSShGANgjRr_Dk6zw0edU8zCu4l5d8dxy0N6PFOUlQfDmpmEQcRTKsBFWMoQHbnxmmNQ/s1278/IMG_5354.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1278" data-original-width="960" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia3L_KE1aNsVs9SFOP5v1wRDzOAYr8YDe0qlPkVrl3P89IEdbOBn0ZrCduPiTWdUn-HJBHhGozSShGANgjRr_Dk6zw0edU8zCu4l5d8dxy0N6PFOUlQfDmpmEQcRTKsBFWMoQHbnxmmNQ/s320/IMG_5354.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bears vs Giants<br />MetLife Stadium<br />November, 2016</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> <p></p><p style="text-align: left;"> </p>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-62549530529177979222020-12-15T09:42:00.005-08:002021-06-16T12:43:16.259-07:00Flick Lives!<p> Around this time of year, when the temperature really starts to drop and mornings become frosty; when the leaf blowers finally go silent and the smell of chimney smoke begins to pervade the block; when most of the houses in the neighborhood dress themselves in lights and wreaths and the lawns fill up with reindeer, snowmen, sleds and Santas; it's right around now that in one bay window there invariably appears a strange sight:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1lQXOavAvxENHWvfD5vkSmZh8yG6DMKpm_H2lO01mykt1X1Oowhyphenhyphen5pegh35cLA2lFurEqIzgJlgKnjyOi4-IHNXJx9JvX6AfI-ZB0_iWdRuCK-o37wdcM39EbfKmpz-BoDnV2JYduEvM/s2048/cs.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1lQXOavAvxENHWvfD5vkSmZh8yG6DMKpm_H2lO01mykt1X1Oowhyphenhyphen5pegh35cLA2lFurEqIzgJlgKnjyOi4-IHNXJx9JvX6AfI-ZB0_iWdRuCK-o37wdcM39EbfKmpz-BoDnV2JYduEvM/s320/cs.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p> This is the notorious <a href="https://www.achristmasstoryhouse.com/a-christmas-story-movie-facts/the-leg-lamp/">leg lamp</a>, made famous in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Story">A Christmas Story</a>, the popular holiday movie co-written and narrated by the legendary humorist <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Shepherd">Jean Shepherd</a>, and based on the semi-autobiographical reminiscences he related in print, in his radio monologues, and in live performances. Initially overlooked when it was released in 1983, the film now consistently ranks among the top holiday movies ever produced. Many know it from TNT and TBSs "24 Hours of <i>A Christmas Story</i>", where it is shown 12 consecutive times, from 8 pm on Christmas Eve to 8 pm on Christmas Day. </p><p> Passing the house on my daily morning walks, I'm reminded of Jean, and the small part he played in my childhood and adolescence. Jean (he was widely known as Shep, but to us he was always Jean) was friends with my best friend Mike's parents, and he could frequently be found visiting their house on Skyline Drive, where I was also a frequent visitor. With the same last name as <i>his </i>erstwhile childhood best friend, we had an immediate connection. I picture him sitting at their big kitchen table, chuckling "There's that Schwartz again," as I passed by on my way up to Mike's room. He would often attend Mike's birthday parties; I remember one in particular when he accompanied us all to Shea Stadium to see the Mets play the Reds. At first, I had no idea who he was, other than that he was some kind of special family friend. But after piling into the back of Mike's family's puke green station wagon for a trip down to Princeton to see him perform at McCarter Theater, I was hooked. </p><p> Jean had a nightly radio show on WOR, where, after the opening theme (Eduard Strauss's <i>Bahn Frei!</i>), he would spin his incredible monologues, and occasionally read poetry, play the kazoo, and organize listener pranks and hoaxes. I started tuning in. Rushing to finish my homework in time, I would sit in my bedroom, listening to the sound of his distinctive voice coming through a little clock radio with the dial at AM 710, entranced by the way he would start out on one path and veer through numerous digressions, twists and turns. With my eye on the clock, watching the digits click by and knowing that time was running out, I would try to guess how in the world he would tie everything together. But like Coltrane coming back to earth after flying off into outer space at the end of <i>My Favorite Things</i>, he always did. And every time one of the stories would refer back to his childhood and his friend Schwartz, as they often did, well, that was an extra special night. The next day Mike and I would compare notes, because I knew he had listened, too. </p><p> Jean's books were also a constant presence, especially <u>Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories</u>. (My original copy became so tattered that the pages started falling out, and I eventually had to get a new one.) I read and reread the stories, and then read them aloud to my brother, sister, and parents. Schwartz, Flick, Kissel, Grover Dill, Scut Farkas; they were all alive in our house. We had next door neighbors who, for reasons that will go unstated here, we referred to as the Bumpeses. The leg lamp? We knew about that from Chapter 10 of <u>In God We Trust: All Other Pay Cash </u> before we saw it in the movie. Of course there was <u>The Ferrari in the Bedroom</u>, which was dedicated to Mike's parents, with Mike's dad being the inspiration behind the main character in the story <i>Abercrombie's Bitch</i>. </p><p> After his radio show ended in 1977, it got harder to find him on the air (remember, this was the cable stone age and <i>way</i> pre-internet), although he did write, direct, and edit a show called <i>Shepherd's Pie</i> on New Jersey Network for a time. Mike and I went away to college, his parents divorced, my parents moved to another town. Jean moved to Florida and I never saw him again. But I <i>was </i>really happy to see him find mainstream success and recognition with <i>A Christmas Story. </i>Now, like Proust's madeleine, seeing the lamp in the window brings back a cascade of memories: my childhood bedroom, the WOR radio days (we loved <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_and_Ray">Bob and Ray </a>too), and of course my best friend Mike, who idolized Jean and who I believed Jean loved. Mike, a journalist by trade, had plans to write his biography. However it was not to be-- Mike was tragically taken from this world 18 years ago. (Mike, I miss you every day. Excelsior, you fathead!) So if you're a fan of <i>A Christmas Story</i>, and that's all you know of him, do yourself a favor and google Jean and do a little research. Read about how influential he was. (Jerry Seinfeld has been quoted as saying, "I learned how to do comedy from Jean Shepherd.") Listen to some of his <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrgnPDjCqtU">recorded monologues.</a> (Think of them as podcasts.) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3naRDmT3QGA">Watch him being interviewed by David Letterman in 1982</a> (where he explains his failures in Algebra class.) And always remember:<a href="https://www.flicklives.com/"> Flick Lives!</a></p><p> </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6sTHGmXWtCcus-b72tBiqoi2TBDJg84zSe-3cqWGGnW6tB2vX2TIC3gBIUso7P2UnldWiYQLBmfyGr3Niuzpql9kWs80S2hGQOKkzreQbp5KPgv0X0uy5g23GDtgmmQu_wBD-qkQ4dRk/s1474/JS.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="982" data-original-width="1474" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6sTHGmXWtCcus-b72tBiqoi2TBDJg84zSe-3cqWGGnW6tB2vX2TIC3gBIUso7P2UnldWiYQLBmfyGr3Niuzpql9kWs80S2hGQOKkzreQbp5KPgv0X0uy5g23GDtgmmQu_wBD-qkQ4dRk/w309-h212/JS.png" width="309" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jean Shepherd<br />July 26, 1921-October 16, 1999</td></tr></tbody></table><br /> <p></p>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-68667587667769958552020-09-15T08:31:00.000-07:002020-09-15T08:37:17.092-07:00"Count Be Wrong, They'll Mess You Up." One of the most unforgettable characters in David Simon's epic masterpiece <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wire">The Wire </a>is Wallace.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wallace is portrayed by a young <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_B._Jordan">Michael B. Jordan</a>. Jordan, who grew up in Newark, NJ, has gone on to star in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruitvale_Station">Fruitvale Station</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantastic_Four_(2015_film)">Fantastic Four</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creed_(film)">Creed</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creed_II">Creed II</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Panther_(film)">Black Panther</a>.<br />
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A low-level drug dealer in the Barksdale crime organization, the sensitive 14 year-old, not much more than a child himself, also acts as a "house dad" to a group of stray youngsters living in an abandoned Baltimore tenement. He rousts them out of bed in the morning, makes sure they have something to eat, and sees them off to school. In a scene that takes place <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lessons_(The_Wire)">late in Season One</a>, he tries to provide some homework help to one of the children, Sarah. She's having difficulty solving a word problem, which Wallace reads back to her from her textbook:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i style="font-size: medium; text-align: start;">A bus traveling on Central Avenue begins its route by picking up eight passengers. At the next stop it picks up four more and an additional two at the third stop while discharging one. At the next to last stop, three passengers get off the bus and another two get on. How many passengers are still on the bus when the last stop is reached?</i></td></tr>
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"Just do it in your head," Wallace tells her. Distracted by another conversation he's carrying on with a housemate, he impatiently dismisses her when she comes up with two wrong answers, first seven and then eight. Finally, (and edited for language):<br />
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<b>Wallace </b><i>(focusing)</i>: Close your eyes. You working a ground stash. Twenty tall pinks. Two fiends come up and ask for two each, another one cops three. Then Bodie hands you ten more, but a white guy rolls up in a car, waves you down, and pays for eight. How many vials you got left?<br />
<b>Sarah </b><i>(without hesitation)</i><b>: </b>Fifteen.<br />
<b>Wallace </b><i>(dismayed)</i><b>: </b>How can you keep the count right, but not do the book problem?<br />
<b>Sarah</b> <i>(matter-of-factly)</i><b>: </b>Count be wrong, they'll mess you up.<br />
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Here's <a href="https://twitter.com/jemelehill">Jemele Hill </a>commenting on the scene on her (and <a href="https://twitter.com/VanLathan">Van Lathan's</a>) excellent Wire rewatch podcast <i><a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/5iXLW1MZdEOpNe5yGdEIjl">Way Down in the Hole:</a></i></div>
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<i>I thought that was a great way to show how potential is being wasted. A good reminder about testing 'cause we've all grown up having to take SAT tests, ACT tests, we had the MEAP test when I was in Michigan, the proficiency exams, and those tests and those problems they're so unrelatable to the kids who are actually taking the test. And this was a very subtle way to make a statement about the cultural inequalities that these tests and the educational system present to children.</i> </blockquote>
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Hill's analysis of Simon's point, which he will develop in depth in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wire_(season_4)">Season Four</a>, is well taken. (One disagreement: it's not very subtle.) And it's one that has been discussed and argued about for at least as long as I've been in the field. Questions and debates related to student engagement with mathematical content, pseudo-context and "real world" problems, true intellectual need vs "you need to know this because it's on the test", how we measure mathematical proficiency and intelligence, the implicit and explicit biases embedded in our curricula and our practice-- these are all encapsulated in this one small scene.<br />
The bus scenario from Sarah's math book is downright tame compared to others we've seen. Consider Dan Meyer's classic <a href="https://blog.mrmeyer.com/2016/rebooting-pseudocontext-saturdays/">dog bandana</a>. Or Cathy Yenca's diner sign: </div>
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No he didn't. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MTBoS?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#MTBoS</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/iteachmath?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#iteachmath</a> <a href="https://t.co/JzpxznRNex">pic.twitter.com/JzpxznRNex</a></div>
— Cathy Yenca (@mathycathy) <a href="https://twitter.com/mathycathy/status/1049717206270038016?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 9, 2018</a></blockquote>
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How about Geoff Krall's trail mix:<br />
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They leave us shaking our heads in dismay. And they'd be hilarious if the stakes weren't so high.<br />
But here I'd like to explore Hill's analysis further, because what's happening here goes beyond simply transcribing Wallace's problem and substituting it for the bus problem in Sarah's textbook to make it more relatable. For one thing, the bus problem is not contrived, like the dog bandana, diner sign, and trail mix problems. I mean, it's contrived for math class, but it's not <i>that</i> much of a stretch. After all, buses do pick up and discharge passengers at bus stops. Growing up in an urban environment, we can assume Sarah has a frame of reference for a city bus picking up and discharging passengers. And for the sake of the discussion here, let's also assume that she can read, and that the issue is not one of comprehension. So why would Sarah have so much trouble with the bus problem? It's not the arithmetic. Is the bus problem one she can't relate to? Just because buses exist in the real world does it necessarily follow that the problem is real for Sarah?<br />
The reason Sarah gives Wallace for her ability to solve his alternate problem is "Count be wrong, they'll mess you up." Sarah, whose after-school activity is running back and forth between a Barksdale drug stash and the customers, understands that an error on the count has very real, very dangerous consequences. This is intellectual need in the extreme. For her, the stakes of mentally adding and subtracting couldn't be higher, and the stakes of correctly solving the book problem pale in comparison. She's got more things on her mind than buses. Wallace, who throughout his time on the series shows real intelligence and curiosity, connects the bus problem to the ground stash problem in order to make it more meaningful. He would excel in a school setting. Sarah cannot make that connection. <br />
The math Sarah does outside of school, the math <i>any </i>of us do outside of school, arises organically from the situations we find ourselves in. We may or may not recognize them as overtly mathematical, and their consequences may range from critical to trivial, but they're there: in the work we do in and around our homes, in our jobs, in what we choose to do with our leisure time. For our students, especially our young ones, it most likely arises from simple play. Let's call it "math in the wild." But there's a wide gap between that math and the math that we encounter in school. Good teachers try to bridge that gap as best they can, and some students (i.e. Wallace) can bridge that gap for themselves. But the gap remains, especially on assessments, especially, as Hill notes, on high-stakes standardized assessments. Unfortunately, it's the performance on those measures that generate our grades and our scores, our opportunities for further educational advancement and, perhaps most important, our feelings of self-worth as learners and human beings. Sarah will likely fail her next math test. But it won't be because she can't add and subtract. So what does her performance on the test really mean? Wallace, who in an alternate universe would be in honors classes, no longer even attends school. <br />
Sarah's situation, like so many others in the show, is a human tragedy. Growing up amidst the violence, poverty, insecurity, systemic racism and trauma that is the Baltimore depicted in <i>The Wire, </i>she faces much bigger obstacles than a word problem in a math book. It's just one small piece of Simon's complex tapestry. But the "wasted potential" Hill is talking about in this particular scene is one that transcends Simon's Baltimore. It happens everywhere students who are smart and capable are meant to feel "less than" in math class. <br />
Fans of <i>The Wire</i> know what happened to Wallace. Here's David Simon in Jonathan Abrams's oral history of the show <u><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/548147/all-the-pieces-matter-by-jonathan-abrams/">All the Pieces Matter</a>:</u> <br />
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<i>People are going to remember Wallace. Wallace is going to bother them for a long time after the whole show is forgotten.</i></blockquote>
He's right. Around for only one season, his impact is felt throughout the rest of the show's run. But here's what I'd like to know: What happened to Sarah?<br />
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-49993137372994610282020-07-28T14:37:00.000-07:002020-07-28T14:37:20.881-07:00Kiss Kiss Bang Bang<div> To mark the 10th anniversary of the Common Core's publication, here are my capsule-length reviews of selected K-8 standards:</div><div>(All reviews stolen from movie listings posted daily in <i>The New York Times.</i>)</div><div><br /></div><div>3.OA.C.7 </div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">By the end of Grade 3, know from memory all products of two one-digit numbers.</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b> Curiously retrograde</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><b><br /></b></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">1.OA.7</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Understand the meaning of the equal sign, and determine if equations involving addition and subtraction are true or false. <i>For example, which of the following equations are true and which are false? </i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i>6 = 6, 7 = 8 - 1, 5 + 2 = 2 + 5, 4 + 1 = 5 + 2 </i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><i> </i>Top notch existential confusion</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i><b><br /></b></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">5.G.3</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Understand that attributes belonging to a category of two-dimensional figures also belongs to all subcategories of that category. <i>For example, all rectangles have four right angles and squares are rectangles, so all squares have four right angles.</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i> </i><b>Laborious brainteaser</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">7.SP.7.b</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Develop a probability model (which may not be uniform) by observing frequencies in the data generated from a chance process. <i>For example, find the approximate probability that a spinning penny will land heads up or that a tossed paper cup will land open-end down. Do the outcomes for the spinning penny appear to be equally likely based on the observed frequencies?</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i> </i><b>Predictable but hard to hate</b><i> </i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i><br /></i></div><div>4.OA.4</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Find all factor pairs for a whole number in the range 1-100. Recognize that a whole number is a multiple of each of its factors. Determine whether a given whole number in the range 1-100 is a multiple of a given one-digit number. Determine whether a given whole number in the range 1-100 is prime or composite. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b> Disaster by the numbers</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">8.EE.8</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Analyze and solve pairs of simultaneous equations.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Zoom, crash, repeat</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">7.NS.2.b</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> Understand that integers can be divided, provided that the divisor is not zero, and every quotient of integers (with non-zero divisor) is a rational number. If <i>p </i>and <i>q</i> are integers, then -(<i>p</i>/<i>q</i>) = (-<i>p</i>)/<i>q</i> = <i>p</i>/(-<i>q</i>). Interpret quotients of rational numbers by describing real-world contexts. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <b>Almost willful lack of fun</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">5.MD.1</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Convert among different-sized standard measurement units within a given measurement system (e.g., convert 5 cm to 0.05 m), and use these conversions in solving multi-step, real world problems. </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <b>Answers questions no one needed to ask</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">4.NBT.3</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Use place value understanding to round multi-digit whole numbers to any place.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b> Blunt and sadistic</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">6.NS.1</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Interpret and compute quotients of fractions, and solve word problems involving division of fractions by fractions, e.g., by using visual fraction models and equations to represent the problem. <i>For example, create a story context for (2/3) ÷ (3/4) and use a visual fraction model to show the quotient; use the relationship between multiplication and division to explain that </i><i>(2/3) ÷ (3/4) = 8/9 </i><i>because 3/4 of 8/9 is 2/3. (In general (a/b) ÷ (c/d) = ad/bc.) How much chocolate will each person get if 3 people share 1/2 lb of chocolate equally? How many 3/4-cup servings are in 2/3 of a cup of yogurt? How wide is a rectangular strip of land with length 3/4 mi and area 1/2 square mi?</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i> </i><b>Overstuffed spectacle</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">2.MD.8</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Solve word problems involving dollar bills, quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies using $ and ¢ symbols appropriately. <i>For example, if you have 2 dimes and 3 pennies, how many cents do you have?</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"> <b>Melancholy melodrama</b></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i> </i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">3.MD.4</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Generate measurement data by measuring lengths using rulers marked with halves and fourths of an inch. Show the data by making a line plot where the horizontal scale is marked off in appropriate units--whole numbers, halves, or quarters.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <b>Best when no one's talking</b> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">7.EE.3</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Solve multi-step real life and mathematical problems posed with positive and negative rational numbers in any form (whole numbers, fractions, and decimals), using tools strategically. Apply properties of operations to calculate with numbers in any form; convert between forms as appropriate; and assess the reasonableness of answers using mental computation and estimation strategies. <i>For example, if a woman making $25 an hour gets a 10% raise, she will make an additional 1/10 of her salary an hour, or $2.50, for a new salary of $27.50. If you want to place a towel bar 9 3/4 inches long in the center of a door that is 27 1/2 inches wide, you will need to place the bar about 9 inches for each edge; this estimate can be used as a check on the exact computation.</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b> Turgid schedule filler</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">5.NBT.5</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Fluently multiply multi-digit whole numbers using the standard algorithm.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b> Incredibly tedious</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">4.NBT.4</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Fluently add and subtract multi-digit whole numbers using the standard algorithm.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> <b>Strictly formulaic</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">6.NS.2</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Solve unit rate problems including those involving unit pricing and constant speed. <i>For example, if it took 7 hours to mow 4 lawns, then at that rate how many lawns could be mowed in 35 hours? At what rate were lawns being mowed?</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i> </i><b>Hack work</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">K.G.5</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Model shapes in the world by building shapes from components (i.e. sticks and clay balls) and drawing shapes.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"> <b>Broad, freewheeling fun</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu6w40wBkWkt6b01GkCE-kqgJK4C-pEPPqP9LmSBirAs_QiGjEr-MTC4vPZjt6ENqmsY9Z2tzpeTpD1xj8ArxVy4UsXeiu0VgQiQCfmlyv6wOy7SNBZHWJ0Kooqe1HTTOKwA0bagfD7oQ/s1184/pk.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="886" data-original-width="1184" height="299" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu6w40wBkWkt6b01GkCE-kqgJK4C-pEPPqP9LmSBirAs_QiGjEr-MTC4vPZjt6ENqmsY9Z2tzpeTpD1xj8ArxVy4UsXeiu0VgQiQCfmlyv6wOy7SNBZHWJ0Kooqe1HTTOKwA0bagfD7oQ/w400-h299/pk.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">h/t <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pauline_Kael">Pauline Kael</a></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><b><br /></b></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"> </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-22383418078456315002020-07-15T15:33:00.000-07:002020-07-15T15:33:48.257-07:00A Requiem For Twitter Math Camp<br />
Five years ago this month I boarded a plane in Newark, NJ and, after a layover in San Francisco, flew into the small airport in Ontario, CA. I had traveled across the country to attend something called Twitter Math Camp, which in the summer of 2015 was being held on the campus of Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, CA. It was difficult to explain to my family, friends and co-workers exactly what it was, or what I was going to be doing there, because I didn't really know myself. Was it a camp? Was it a conference? What does twitter have to do with it? How is it all organized? What I did know was that I was going to get to see some of the MTBoS people who had inspired me to explore new ways to teach math and who had supported and encouraged my attempts to blog about my experiences. I had never met any of them, and was more than a little apprehensive about what they would be like in person, and how welcoming the community in general would be. I had struck up an online friendship with Graham Fletcher, and he agreed to share a room with me and split what turned out to be a <i>very </i>small rental car. He was standing outside the terminal when I walked out with my bag, and we recognized each other immediately. I reached out my hand, but he shook his head, opened his arms, and gave me a giant bear hug that nearly crushed me to death. <div><div> TMC '15 was everything I could have hoped for, and much, much more. Beyond the amazing sessions, it was an opportunity to meet people from all over the country, all over the world, actually. People who were involved in math education in all kinds of different ways: elementary school teachers and district administrators, university professors and math coaches; private school, public school and home school; urban, suburban, rural; big, small, and in between. We were all there, on our own time and on our own dime, because we were passionate about what we did and eager to learn from each other. During the day we went to sessions, interspersed with keynotes and quick hit "My Favorites". After, we hung out in the courtyard of the hotel till all hours of the night. I couldn't sleep, my head was spinning at 100 miles per hour. I kept Graham up all night, blabbering away non-stop about who I had met, what we had talked about and what I was going to do when I got back to the world. He told me I was drinking from a firehose. He also told me to stop talking and go back to sleep. By Sunday morning's final assembly I was emotionally exhausted. When a group of participants stood up and sang a goodbye song, I started to tear up. And when Lisa Henry announced the date and location of next year's TMC, I immediately phoned my wife and told her to block it out on the calendar.</div><div> When I got back home everyone asked: "What was it like?" </div><div> All I could think of was something that Christopher Danielson had said: "It's like being in the faculty lounge of your dreams." Like baseball fantasy camp, except with math teachers. </div><div> </div><div> </div><div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> I went back to Twitter Math Camp in 2016, 2017, and 2018. Each time I was afraid that the magic would be gone, that I would be disappointed, that it wouldn't live up to my expectations. Each time I was wrong. Part of it was the different locations--it was fun to explore a new city each summer. Part of it was reconnecting with old friends. Part was the fact that each time I went back I connected with new people, widening my network of friends and colleagues, which made our virtual interactions during the rest of the year richer. Part of it was my own increasing confidence presenting sessions. Although I knew that attendance was capped and I wasn't guaranteed a spot, I began to count on it to recharge my batteries for the coming school year. </div><div style="text-align: left;"> More than the venues, more than the cities, more than the sessions, more than the keynotes, more than the math, for me TMC was a place where, for four brief days, 200 lives intersected in a very intimate way. Shared breakfasts, lunches, and dinners. Early morning coffees and late nights in hotel courtyards and lobbies and, on one special occasion, in a college dorm. Clusters in the corners of classrooms. On stairwells and in hallways, on Ubers and in airports. I couldn't even begin to count all the different conversations I had with all the different people I met along the way. They challenged me, informed me, encouraged me. They agreed and pushed back. They listened, and no matter how crazy I sounded they made me feel like I had something worthwhile to say. For me, it was different than the big, industrial NCTM conferences. Nobody was selling anything, nobody was angling for a deal or working the room, or trying to impress anybody. It wasn't institutional. It was t-shirts and shorts. It was, as we would say in Yiddish, <a href="https://www.yourdictionary.com/haimish#:~:text=haim%C2%B7ish,you%20feel%20at%20ease%20in.">haimish</a>.</div><div style="text-align: left;"> In 2018 I convinced a former work colleague to join me. Now I was the old hand and she was the nervous newbie. I was curious to see her reaction and to look at something I had begun to take for granted through her eyes. How would she would find the experience? I told her that I'd always be around for her, that I wouldn't leave her without someone to have breakfast, lunch, or dinner with, or to hang out with after the day's sessions were through. There had been talk that things had gotten cliquey, that newcomers weren't being made to feel especially welcome. I knew that people experienced TMC in different ways, and that the leadership had made attempts to make people feel more included. I knew that not everyone felt the same way about it that I did. Turns out I had nothing to worry about: after the first day she had met a bunch of people and made her own friends, some of whom became my new friends. She talked about going back. I started making plans with Brian Miller to submit a proposal to co-present a session at TMC '19 in Berkeley.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> I didn't see it coming. One day the acceptances came out, and then, suddenly, it imploded. I've worked through the stages of grief, and I think I've finally arrived at acceptance. Looking back these last few weeks at my pictures, revisiting the <a href="http://twittermathcamp.pbworks.com/w/page/66474056/TMathC%20FrontPage">archives </a>and the old tweets, my heart is filled with gratitude for all those who worked so hard to make it happen. I'm sorry if I didn't let you know just how thankful I am. I know I was blessed to be able to experience those 16 special days in the summers of 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018. It's not my intention to reopen any wounds or reignite any debates. It's just I never got the chance to say goodbye.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikU0ZtmuBusBjW9brSBgdgc042PAHKGJq35zdhK4CkKkX8Sz_KDiAnEoCWlwO8t2b3XoSlvraCfzAEvJHDuNf1CnUgv1CaUyJsj8_9RZuA-PZ5M91pPXWCCrHCP0cJBxbH1oYr32Wbyl8/s1278/tmc.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="336" data-original-width="1278" height="131" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikU0ZtmuBusBjW9brSBgdgc042PAHKGJq35zdhK4CkKkX8Sz_KDiAnEoCWlwO8t2b3XoSlvraCfzAEvJHDuNf1CnUgv1CaUyJsj8_9RZuA-PZ5M91pPXWCCrHCP0cJBxbH1oYr32Wbyl8/w500-h131/tmc.png" width="500" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div> </div></div></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-39693485133654835382020-07-01T15:23:00.000-07:002020-07-01T15:23:27.415-07:00And Then They Came For the Statisticians<header class="entry__header" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #282828; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br /></header><div><div style="text-align: left;"><blockquote><font face="helvetica">ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) -- The world's largest statisticians group added to a chorus of criticism this week against the recent hiring of two political appointees at the U.S. Census Bureau. The American Statistical Association says the appointments earlier this week of Nathan Cogley and Adam Korzeniewski to top posts even though they have little experience at the agency "are in direct conflict with the bureau's mission to ensure proper, accurate, and timely delivery of statistical information to the public." Cogley is a political science professor who wrote a series of opinion pieces against the impeachment of Donald Trump. Korzeniewski is a former campaign consultant to the pro-Trump YouTube personality known as "Joey Salads.</font>"</blockquote><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: right;"><a href="https://hosted.ap.org/article/4dcf87d1a9064e7038af85104dfcd0ca/statisticians-join-criticism-against-census-bureau-hires">Statisticians Join Criticism Against Census Bureau Hires</a></div><div style="text-align: right;">Mike Schneider</div><div style="text-align: right;">Associated Press</div><div style="text-align: right;">June 26, 2020 </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"><font face="helvetica">...the suppression of its findings and the murder of those who organized it was nothing less than the obliteration of the capacity for self-analysis. An authoritarian society, however, that is unable to form an idea of itself, whatever social engineering its leadership may have in mind, is doomed to the blind exercise of state violence.</font></div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: right;">Karl Schlögel </div><div style="text-align: right;"><u><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16182695-moscow-1937">Moscow 1937 </a></u></div><blockquote><div style="text-align: left;"> </div></blockquote></div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> For one 24 hour period, from midnight January 6, 1937 to the following midnight, life in the entire breadth of the Soviet Union, one-sixth of the world, came to a stop. On that day, after weeks of extensive training, one million enumerators (census takers) with a list of fourteen questions spread out over the entire country. Their mission was to collect the information that, when analyzed and pieced together, would form a detailed picture of what Soviet society looked like twenty years after the Bolshevik Revolution. The enumerators knocked on the doors of apartment blocks in Moscow, skied across the Arctic tundra to remote villages, and rode with passengers on the Trans-Siberian Express. As Karl Schlögel describes in his book <u>Moscow 1937</u>: </div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><blockquote> Whether in the cities or on a river steamer, in a yurt in Kazakhstan or in a hotel in Leningrad... from different districts of the capital, from the capitals of the republics, from Kiev, from Ashbagat, from the Taiga and the Pacific ports, from the newly built suburbs. The armada of enumerators ...not only penetrated the furthest corners of the Soviet Union; it systematically explored the social landscape...(and) discovered a Soviet Union in miniature.</blockquote></i></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i> </i>The populace was ready. The census protocol had been highly publicized in workplaces and shops and over state media outlets. The questions submitted to the Party leadership by the Census Board were edited by Party leader and supreme ruler of the USSR Joseph Stalin personally (he had removed eight and added one) and had been released in advance so citizens knew exactly what to expect when an enumerator showed up on their doorstep. It was a remarkable achievement, one that required careful planning, tremendous resources and a nationwide mobilization. What makes it even more astonishing is that, according to Schlögel, historians and demographers with access to the formerly suppressed results--made available in the 1990s after the Soviet Union's collapse--have calculated the margin of error at a low 0.5 to 0.6 percent. </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWnxIkU8oqHVv0cr0O8aznnsu89J2N2kYqw-6BqdhUgcyL-lZyhXH3qo0uotuaU0vdtexln7vtlLH9zSWlhCUYN5Q7w8-KgroUKEg74XADeUyrbKpjXL2pLBeW9anKhHkvviEar3wapPk/s618/poster.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="618" data-original-width="460" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWnxIkU8oqHVv0cr0O8aznnsu89J2N2kYqw-6BqdhUgcyL-lZyhXH3qo0uotuaU0vdtexln7vtlLH9zSWlhCUYN5Q7w8-KgroUKEg74XADeUyrbKpjXL2pLBeW9anKhHkvviEar3wapPk/w298-h400/poster.png" width="298" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Information poster<br /><br /></td></tr></tbody></table> </i>It was Stalin who had ordered the census, and he had a lot riding on its outcome. It had been eleven years since the last one, a time of rapid industrialization and societal upheaval. A program of forced agricultural collectivization and two Five-Year Plans had run their course. Stalin believed that the demographic figures would prove that the Soviet Union had built a vibrant, happy and healthy society. High growth rates were predicted, outstripping those of rival capitalist countries. Officially, a population figure of 170-172 million was expected (a number extrapolated from the 1926 census); Stalin was hoping for something closer to 180 million. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ3-F0X6MFAHmscJ3u8Y-ZOI62ni-AXBQ3z4xvi7aOpdxi738PhjPOS6KUpRELs-poTif6yxAcGdZEG825Bh5hVbCrf8LF5V-C1io4BnmbZSStQ4yzptw8BTVAt2Wc5YCYZy1KOcfHgXU/s1520/process.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1050" data-original-width="1520" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ3-F0X6MFAHmscJ3u8Y-ZOI62ni-AXBQ3z4xvi7aOpdxi738PhjPOS6KUpRELs-poTif6yxAcGdZEG825Bh5hVbCrf8LF5V-C1io4BnmbZSStQ4yzptw8BTVAt2Wc5YCYZy1KOcfHgXU/w400-h276/process.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Census data being processed</td></tr></tbody></table> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> They knew they were in trouble almost immediately. Preliminary results indicated that average growth, while surpassing Germany, England, and France, was exceeded by both the United States and Japan. Stalin's added question was about religious affiliation; he expected the state's anti-religion policies to reflect a high number of non-believers. Yet close to 60% of the adult population identified themselves as believers. Most alarming, the final count would be somewhere around 162 million, 8 million people shy of the official pronouncement. I.A. Kraval, the Census Bureau Chief, ordered a recount, but only several thousand unenumerated persons were found. In late January, the provisional results were presented to the Party leadership, and a further report in March confirmed the original figures. Kraval and his team of demographers and statisticians, fighting for what they knew were their lives, did their best to excuse the results, but the difference between the final count and the publicly stated number of 170 million was too great to explain away.</div><div style="text-align: left;"> Where were the missing 8 million? And who was to blame? The biggest discrepancies between the expected numbers and the actual count were in the regions hardest hit by the devastating 1932-1933 famine caused by Stalin's policy of forced collectivization. Historians are still debating the actual death toll--estimates range up to 7 million--and also to what extent anyone at the time had an accurate fatality count. (Ironically Kraval was sending false reports to Stalin, downplaying the numbers.) In any case, the famine had been officially denied, and anyone who talked about it risked imprisonment and death. The census data, which reflected the tragic consequences of Stalin's policy, had to be suppressed. So did those involved with the data collection. </div><div style="text-align: left;"> The arrests began in March. No one was safe; from the members of the central Census Bureau to the chiefs of the regional census centers, right down to administrators at the local level. Statisticians assigned to replace the imprisoned were soon imprisoned themselves. The statisticians and demographers were accused of sabotage and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrecking_(Soviet_Union)">"wrecking"</a>, and labeled "Trotskyite-Bukharinite spies" and "enemies of the people". Many of those imprisoned were eventually executed. Kraval himself was condemned to death in August and shot. A new census was planned for 1939. Schlögel links this to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge">the Great Terror</a>: </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"><i>...having destroyed the analytical matrix which disclosed the contours of the nation and its people, and having sacrificed the very instrument that would enable them to interpret these things, the leadership... (was) overcome by a blind flight into terror, an intensification of violence whose excesses would surpass the very disasters that the census had just diagnosed. As a result, for the catastrophe that followed there were no longer any instruments that might have diagnosed what was to come. </i> </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> Not surprisingly, the new census resulted in a population count of 170.6 million people. Just what Stalin had ordered. The question about religious affiliation was eliminated. There would not be another census until 1959. </div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">* </div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> Suppression of truth and truth-tellers isn't exclusive to the former Soviet Union. It's not hard to come up with examples of our own. The data linking smoking to cancer and the cover-up of abuses by clergy in the Catholic Church are two that come to mind. We know stories of individual whistleblowers coming to bad ends (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Silkwood">see Karen Silkwood</a>) and we also know of consumer advocates forcing changes to promote public safety (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ralph_Nader">see Ralph Nader</a>). Thankfully, we have avenues to access information, mechanisms to uncover truths, protections for those who would speak truth to power and independent media outlets to publicize those truths that would be unthinkable in the Soviet Union under Stalin. Our system of government is based on checks and balances, and while it may not always work the way we want it to, it does provide a measure of protection against the worst autocratic tendencies of an executive, protections that, again, would have been unthinkable to Stalin.</div><div style="text-align: left;"> Consider the case of our census, currently in progress. When the Trump administration tried to add a question related to citizenship, it was met with resistance and criticism, not only from progressives, but from statisticians and demographers, who argued it would threaten its integrity, estimating that inclusion of the question could lead to an undercount of 9 million people. The pretext for adding the question was seen as strictly political; it was a way to depress the count in heavily Democratic areas, which would have consequences for proportional representation in Congress, how many electoral votes a state receives, and how and where some $1.5 trillion in federal money is allocated. A lawsuit challenging the question made its way to the Supreme Court. In a <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/06/opinion-analysis-court-orders-do-over-on-citizenship-question-in-census-case/">fractured and complicated 5-4 decision</a>, the court ruled that the justification for adding the question was invalid. Unable to delay the implementation of the constitutionally mandated decennial census, the administration threw in the towel. </div><div style="text-align: left;"> However the recent appointments of Cogley, a frequent radio commentator and former head of the department of government, legal studies and philosophy at Tarleton State University and Korzeniewski, who once worked as a consultant for the failed Staten Island congressional run of <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/joey-salads-youtube-star-famous-for-racist-pranks-launches-congressional-bid">Joey "Joey Salads" Saladino</a>, a YouTuber famous for racist pranks, and whose primary qualification seems to have been that he once worked in a census bureau field office, to top positions at the U.S. Census Bureau should be cause for alarm. It certainly is to Kenneth Prewitt, a former Bureau director. "These are two people ill equipped to actually manage the census," he said in a Politico report:</div><div style="text-align: left;"><blockquote><i>They're very well equipped to advance political interests, especially those of the Republican Party. That's their background and their career goals. It's unprecedented for two political appointees to be added to the bureau in the middle of a census count in the recent history of the Census Bureau.</i></blockquote></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> What influence will they exert on the counting and reporting of the census figures? Will they be guided by best statistical and demographic practices? Do they even know (or care) what those practices are? Were they put there to do the bidding of the administration that appointed them? Will the final census be an accurate reflection of America in the year 2020? And if it isn't, will we even know?</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div><div style="text-align: left;"> All this is to say that our community has a very important role to play. Math helps build the models, math looks at the data, math runs the statistical analysis. It's our job to call bullshit when we see it...</div><div style="text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p dir="ltr" lang="en">Inspired by recent tweets from <a href="https://twitter.com/Zakchamp?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Zakchamp</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/K_Larsen_Teach?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@K_Larsen_Teach</a>, I am now collecting TURDs (truly unfortunate representations of data) for a “Fix That Graph” unit. Please deposit your submissions in the comments below 👇<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/MTBoS?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#MTBoS</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/iteachmath?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#iteachmath</a> <a href="https://t.co/RsDXsgjrqt">pic.twitter.com/RsDXsgjrqt</a></p>— Andrew Gael (@bkdidact) <a href="https://twitter.com/bkdidact/status/1276199636055797762?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 25, 2020</a></blockquote><div><br /></div><div>...and it's our job to give our students not only the tools they need to be discriminating and critical consumers of information, but the confidence to use their voices to speak out when they see data being used to deliberately manipulate and confuse; whether it's related to: </div><div>something as innocuous, like how many people attend an inauguration, </div><div>something important, like a census count, </div><div>something serious, like the death toll from the coronavirus, or </div><div>something that threatens the very existence of life on the planet, like climate change. </div><div>So whether you're in kindergarten teaching kids how to count with one-to one correspondence or in high school teaching AP Stats, or anywhere else above, below, in between or sideways, please keep your shoulder to the wheel. </div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3cOS_solesawGOx7gbImJ_SGGpkePUa_Vo-3PTgDs0_kDTuLa615UFB5gfLwdB5-dJGVBl9W23Px0RoRi7GPavtPJs4ETCaqhGv4P_I_1IKRM62o7JhWN31GfopwsPLXSu7kztmD4MGE/s590/air.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="582" data-original-width="590" height="395" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3cOS_solesawGOx7gbImJ_SGGpkePUa_Vo-3PTgDs0_kDTuLa615UFB5gfLwdB5-dJGVBl9W23Px0RoRi7GPavtPJs4ETCaqhGv4P_I_1IKRM62o7JhWN31GfopwsPLXSu7kztmD4MGE/w400-h395/air.png" width="400" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> </div> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script></div>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-28524036498773878652020-06-12T08:21:00.002-07:002020-07-02T13:45:59.336-07:00Solidarity...Forever? So it turns out that police unions are bad actors. <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/12/how-police-unions-keep-abusive-cops-on-the-street/383258/">(Yes, I am <i>way </i>late to this</a><a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/12/how-police-unions-keep-abusive-cops-on-the-street/383258/">.</a>) Will Bunche, <a href="https://www.inquirer.com/opinion/commentary/police-unions-defend-brutality-george-floyd-protests-20200607.html">in a recent opinion piece in the Philadelphia Inquirer,</a> likens police unions to "A protection racket, sounding more like the Mafia than anything 'benevolent.'" As difficult as it is for me to watch the videos and hear the accounts of police murder and brutality, it's almost as hard to watch the displays of solidarity from police unions as they circle the wagons. And as <a href="https://www.joincampaignzero.org/">I learn about the role they've played, and continue to play</a>, in perpetuating the institutionalized racism that exists in the law enforcement community today, I have to admit to a moment of extreme cognitive dissonance, because for me union has always equaled good.<div> There's more. According to a <a href="https://thisisreno.com/2020/06/as-protests-grow-big-labor-sides-with-police-unions/">June 7 news article</a>, Public Integrity contacted the leaders of ten major unions and labor groups:</div><div> <i></i></div><blockquote><div><i>None were willing to talk about police unions. Trumka, of the AFL-CIO, was too busy to chat. The president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union couldn't fit a call into his schedule. Teamsters President James Hoffa declined to comment.</i></div><div><i> Silence from the Service Employees Union, The American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, United Auto Workers, Communication Workers of America, Unite Here and the American Federation of Teachers.</i></div></blockquote><div><i></i></div><div><i> </i>My union, the NEA, and its state affiliate NJEA, have posted strong statements in support of racial justice, and <a href="https://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2020/06/AFT-NEA-teachers-unions-police-practices-national-overhaul.html">called for a federal push to overhaul police practices</a>. But, at least as of the time I write this, they have been quiet on the matter of police unions and the role they have played in protecting members that have absolutely no business carrying a shield and a gun. Maybe that will change. But that change will be difficult, because it will require some serious self-reflection and soul-searching. <i> </i></div><div> <i> </i><span style="color: #313131; font-family: "pt serif", serif;"> </span></div><div> </div><div style="text-align: center;">* </div><div><br /></div><div> I was a proud, dues paying member of the teacher's union my entire career. I knew that the only reason I earned the wage I did, and enjoyed the benefits and working conditions I did, was because of union solidarity. Same goes for the benefits I now enjoy in retirement. (I also know what it feels like to be a member of a union under siege, because I was a teacher during the reign of Chris Christie. Christie made his reputation by making the NJEA his personal punching bag. He bullied us on air and in person. He told us we were turning our students into "drug mules." He encouraged newspaper editorial writers and talk show hosts and callers on NJ 101.5 as they vilified us: we were greedy, selfish, and lazy. We didn't deserve our health care or our pensions. We were the reason New Jersey was in such dire financial straits. We were the reason the education system was failing. It was all our fault.) I knew that in 1984, just two years before I started, teachers in the district had gone on strike. They walked a picket line, were fined, and some had even been arrested and served jail time. Those teachers, and others before them, helped win me those benefits, and I saw it as my responsibility to make sure they were there for the next generation of teachers. I served many years as a building rep, with all the responsibilities that position entails. And though we never went out on strike, I participated in plenty of job actions: writing letters, wearing buttons and shirts, working "to the contract" by entering and/or leaving the building not a minute before/after the negotiated start/end time, showing up and speaking out at Board of Ed meetings, rallying outside central office during negotiation sessions. I knew those negotiations were extremely important; they would affect our salaries, benefits, working conditions, and job protections. </div><div> Job protections. Lord knows, I knew good teachers, great teachers, who were the target of extremely unfair smear campaigns from vindictive administrators and unhappy parents. In many of those cases, a union rep or a union lawyer was the only thing standing between them and career oblivion. That <i>could've</i> been me. And as I rose ever higher on the salary guide, and the district could afford to hire two teachers for my one salary, who was to say that I might be the next one with a target on my back? Knowing that I had the union behind me was no small comfort. And who knew what laws the government might enact that would curtail those benefits and protections? As one of our union lobbyists put it, "I'm the guy you pay to protect you from the guys you elect." </div><div><div> How far did those job protections extend? I mean, I've also known teachers who've had no business being in front of a class. I had one or two as a student myself (so did my kids) and as colleagues. The no-patience serial screamers and sarcastic insulters. The burned out and jaded, phoning-it-in morale killers. The ones whose classroom no parent who was in-the-know wanted their kid in. The ones who make kids cry. They got harassed with bad evaluations and transferred from grade to grade and school to school in the hopes that they'd just give up and quit. Some did, but other hung on. Did the contract make it too difficult to fire them? Did the union protect them, too? What did that make me, as an active union supporter? It's true, we're not allowed to exercise state-sanctioned acts of physical violence like the police. (In New Jersey, anyway. There are nineteen states that allow corporal punishment in schools.) However what kind of state sanctioned <i>emotional </i>violence are we allowed to commit? What is our responsibility when we witness that kind of violence? Do we have a "duty to intervene"? What is our union's responsibility? Is our silence complicity?</div><div><br /></div></div><div style="text-align: center;">*</div><div><div><br /></div><div> In 1931, during the bloody miners strike in Harlan County, Kentucky, armed deputies hired by the coal company were enlisted to root out union leaders and their sympathizers, many of whom were beaten, jailed, and even killed. One night, in an attempt at intimidation, Sheriff J.H. Blair and his men illegally entered union leader Sam Reece's house and conducted a search. Reece, warned in advance, had fled. His wife Florence, home alone with their seven children, watched in terror as the sheriff and his deputized thugs ransacked the house and kept watch outside, ready to shoot him if he returned. </div><div> Later, she tore a sheet off an old wall calendar and composed the lyrics to what would become one of the most haunting and inspiring union songs ever written. It's a desperate plea and a rallying cry, comprised of six verses and set to the tune of what is either an old Baptist hymn or a British ballad. She titled it after the one simple question repeated in the chorus. It was a question directed at working men and women, commanding them to choose: you're either with us or against us. And it's a question echoing from those coal mines right back at us at this very moment: </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Which side are you on?</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: left;"> I still believe in the union. Without it, we're powerless to control our working conditions and the economic terms under which we ply our trade. But as I look outward and try to understand what is going right now in our country and the changes that need to take place, I'm looking inward too. At my own preconceptions and beliefs, my own action and inaction, and my own blind spots. And I want my union to do the same. </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Nzudto-FA5Y" width="320" youtube-src-id="Nzudto-FA5Y"></iframe></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><br /></div><div> </div><div><br /></div><div> </div><div> </div></div>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-90056761370938309762020-05-21T09:37:00.001-07:002020-05-29T04:52:11.658-07:00Greetings From the Planet Tralfamadore<b>1. The Soldier</b> <br />
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At approximately noon on Wednesday, February 14, 1945, a group of American POWs climbed out of an underground meat locker in the middle of Dresden, Germany. It was a break in the middle of a two day, combined British and American aerial attack that would drop nearly 4,000 tons of high explosive bombs and incendiary devices on and around the city, known as "Florence on the Elbe". The war was nearing its end, and Dresden had thus far escaped the fiery destruction that many other German cities, including Berlin and Hamburg, had already seen. But time had run out. The bombing and resulting firestorm destroyed over 1,600 acres and killed approximately 25,000, most of whom were civilians.<br />
Among the POWs emerging from the meat locker that Valentine's Day was a 22 year old private from Indianapolis, Indiana. He had enlisted in March, 1943 after leaving Cornell, where he was majoring in bio-chemistry while writing for and editing the university's independent newspaper, <i>The Cornell Daily Sun</i>. Trained as an intelligence scout, he was shipped overseas with the 106th Infantry Division in time for the Battle of the Bulge, part of the final German offensive of the war. His sector was overrun, and on December 19, 1944 he was captured somewhere in Luxembourg. He joined a collection of other prisoners, and together they were marched sixty miles before being crammed into small, unheated, unventilated boxcars, part of a train slowly making its way to a large POW camp near Berlin. On January 10, 1945 he was one of 150 prisoners shipped to Dresden, where by day he labored in a factory that produced vitamin-enriched malt syrup for pregnant women and at night ate and slept locked in an abattoir that had been converted into a barracks.<br />
When the bombs began to drop on the night of February 13, he, his fellow prisoners and their six German guards took shelter in a meat locker three stories underground. There, cool amid the dressed cadavers of cattle, sheep, pigs, and horses, they told jokes and listened to the sound of what he would later describe as, "The footsteps of giants marching across the earth." The prisoners and their guards suffered nothing worse than a light dusting of paint chips falling from the ceiling. "When we came up the city was gone," he recalled. "They burnt the whole damn town down."<br />
Unsure of what to do next, the guards held the prisoners at attention for several hours before leading them on a trek across the rubble to an innkeeper's stable on the outskirts of town. Two days later the prisoners were marched back into the ruins and put to work.<br />
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<i> "We walked into the city and dug into basements and shelters to get the corpses out, as a sanitary measure," </i>he later wrote. "<i>When we went into them, a typical shelter, an ordinary basement usually, looked like a streetcar full of people who'd simultaneously had heart failure. Just people sitting there in chairs, all dead. ...We brought the dead out. They were loaded on wagons and taken to parks, large open areas in the city which weren't filled with rubble. The Germans got funeral pyres going... It was a terribly elaborate Easter egg hunt."</i><br />
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Less than three months after the Dresden bombing, Germany surrendered.<br />
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Twenty-five years later, in March, 1969, the former POW from Indianapolis, Indiana published a book, a book in which he tried to come to terms with the horror of what he had seen, a book that took its title from the abattoir, the one whose meat locker had kept him safe, the one from which he had emerged to witness the aftermath of the destruction of the city called "Florence on the Elbe", the one the Germans called <i>Schlachtof-funf</i>.<br />
The soldier's name was Kurt Vonnegut.<br />
The book he wrote was <u>Slaughterhouse-Five</u>.<br />
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<b>2. The Professor</b><br />
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Less than three miles away, in the city center at Zeughausstrasse Number 1, in a so-called Jews' House, another former journalist, this one a 63 year old professor of Romance language and literature, was having quite a different experience. Born to a Jewish family in Landsberg an der Warthe, in the eastern part of the Prussian province of Brandenburg, he had converted to Christianity, married a Protestant musicologist and pianist, served at the front in World War One and, in 1920, secured a teaching post at Dresden Technical University. However his conversion, marriage, position, and war record were of little consequence when the Nazis came to power. Starting in 1933, and continuing through the 1935 Nuremberg Laws, he was stripped of his citizenship rights, job, pension, house, access to his bank account, freedom of movement, freedom of speech, and even his beloved pet cat. His status as Jew in a mixed marriage with a Christian woman had<i> </i>thus far enabled him to avoid being sent to a concentration camp, but by the beginning of February, 1945 there were less than 200 registered Jews left in the city, and plans for the final liquidation of the ghetto were in motion. All Jews capable of physical labor were to report for deportation on the morning of Friday, February 16. It was a death sentence. For the professor, time had run out.<br />
When the bombs started falling on the night of Tuesday, February 13, there was no meat locker sixty feet underground in which to find safe haven. The makeshift air raid shelters in the "Jews' cellars" of Zeughausstrasse Numbers 1-3 were immediately turned into death traps. Separated from his wife, out in the open and nursing an eye injury caused by the shattering of the cellar window, he threw himself into a bomb crater, then climbed out and sought safety in a telephone kiosk. Knapsack on his back, carrying a bag with manuscripts and jewelry, he followed a group of people making their way to a promenade high over the Elbe called Bruhl's Terrace--(forbidden to Jews--but did it matter anymore?)-- where, in shock, he spent the night watching the city burn.<br />
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<i> "To the right and left buildings were ablaze</i>, he wrote a week later in his diary, <i>"the Belvedere and--probably--the Art Academy. Whenever the showers of sparks became too much for me on one side, I dodged to the other. Within a wider radius nothing but fires. Standing out like a torch on this side of the Elbe, the tall building at Pirnaischer Platz, glowing white; on the other side, the roof of the Finance Ministry."</i><br />
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It started to rain. The city continued to burn. By seven the next morning the terrace began to empty. As he began the walk down to the Elbe he found his wife sitting on a suitcase. She had been pulled into the block's "Aryan cellar", crawled out a broken window, and survived the night in two separate basements, the first in the Albertinum, an art museum, then in the Belvedere Hotel. Now reunited, they wandered through the hellscape.<br />
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<i> "We walked slowly, because I was now carrying both bags and my limbs hurt, along the riverbank... Above us, building after building was a burned-out ruin. Down here by the river... masses of empty, rectangular cases of the stick incendiary bombs protruding from the churned up earth... the corpses and smashed vehicles...burned out sheds...fires, at times small, and no more than a bundle of clothes... past the corpses up and down the Elbe. Every house a burned out ruin... Again and again fires still burning. Nowhere a sign of attempts to extinguish them."</i><br />
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After an unsuccessful attempt to find a physician to tend to his injured eye, they made their way to the square in front of Zeughausstrasse. Their building, the third Jews' House they had lived in since being evicted from their home in the Dresden suburb of Dolzschen in 1940, had been reduced to rubble.<br />
Although there were no warning sirens, the second wave of bombing that afternoon did somewhat less damage to the city center. Back at the outer wall of the Bruhl Terrace, the professor and his wife were again separated. Starving and exhausted, they met back in the basement of the Albertinum, where, amid the wounded and traumatized survivors, they waited out the bombardment, sharing their experiences and trying to sleep. The next morning they were evacuated to a nearby air base, where they received food and medical attention. A few days later, carrying the suitcase, bag and knapsack containing all their earthly possessions, they walked five miles to the small town of Piskowitz, where they were welcomed into the home of their former housekeeper, and where the professor wrote down, while it was still fresh in his mind, his nightmarish experience of the firebombing in his diary.<br />
The professor had been keeping a diary since 1918. To continue writing during the Third Reich was an act of bravery; discovery meant certain death for him, his wife (who due to her Aryan status was afforded freedom of movement and thus had the ability to smuggle pages out) and their gentile friend on the outskirts of the city who was keeping the ever-growing document hidden. But he continued. <i>"I shall go on writing," </i>he entered in the diary on May 27, 1942.<i> "That is my heroism. I will bear witness, precise witness!" </i><br />
In 1995, 35 years after his death, the professor's diaries were published to universal acclaim. In its pages he tries to come to terms with how to live his life in a country he loved but no longer recognized, a country that stripped him of everything he had, a country that was murdering members of a tribe to which he no longer belonged, a country that was now coming to murder him.<br />
The professor's name was Victor Klemperer.<br />
The book he wrote was <u>I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years 1933-1945</u>.<br />
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<b>3. The City</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh418jPNU6jGelEiqW7aIboQ-3Dyn0yli14TYi4mNQBDZq1WF76n87GSgklvjjFIOtyEv_12IMB89VhpVmWeR6f4MDecZ06uAuQGolgxKhGsk8rT9qs25Rr0DHP9ga3iTcIUmjRYQAHndw/s1600/the+city.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="867" data-original-width="1600" height="345" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh418jPNU6jGelEiqW7aIboQ-3Dyn0yli14TYi4mNQBDZq1WF76n87GSgklvjjFIOtyEv_12IMB89VhpVmWeR6f4MDecZ06uAuQGolgxKhGsk8rT9qs25Rr0DHP9ga3iTcIUmjRYQAHndw/s640/the+city.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<b>4. The Meeting</b><br />
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<b> </b>I want to believe that somewhere in the bombed out ruins of Dresden, on Valentine's Day, 1945, Kurt Vonnegut and Victor Klemperer crossed paths. It would be highly unlikely, but not impossible. We know that Vonnegut and his fellow POWs left the city on the afternoon of February 14. Klemperer, reunited with his wife after having spent Tuesday night on Bruhl's Terrace, and spent the 14th making his way first to the Jewish cemetery, then to Borsburgstrasse in search of his doctor, then to Zeughausstrasse, before heading back to Bruhl's Terrace and the basement of the Albertinum. It's true Klemperer makes no mention in his diary of an encounter with a detachment of American POWs; he's a meticulous observer and it's unlikely he'd leave out a detail like that. And while I'm not sure where the innkeeper's stable was located, I doubt the route taken by the prisoners as they fled the bombing's aftermath would have taken them through the city center. But like I said, I want to believe. <br />
Klemperer passes Vonnegut, and right at that moment their eyes meet. They sense something, some kind of connection; they're both writers after all. And maybe that's it. But I want to believe there's more.<br />
Vonnegut was a fourth generation German-American, and both his parents spoke German. Vonnegut wasn't fluent, but he did speak the language--he became de facto leader of the prisoner group due to his ability to communicate with the guards. Klemperer spoke a little English; he records in his diary that he began taking lessons from an English speaking friend on the off-chance he could find a way to emigrate to America. They have a conversation. KV and VK.<br />
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<b>5. "All Moments, Past, Present, and Future..."</b><br />
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<b> </b><u>Slaughterhouse-Five</u> (subtitled <i>The Children's Crusade), </i>Vonnegut's sixth book, is the one that made him famous-- an anti-war book published at the height of the social unrest caused by America's involvement in Vietnam. Impressionistic and episodic; disorienting and disturbing; equal parts science fiction, satire, reportage, and black comedy; a meditation on war and its costs, morality, free will, time, and the nature of humanity; it's a book that leaves an indelible impression--for me a much different one as an adult than it did as a teenager. The main character, Billy Pilgrim, is an American soldier who has a World War Two experience very similar to Vonnegut's. (The first chapter, narrated by Vonnegut in the first person, describes the book's origin story. "All this happened, more or less," he explains in the very first line. "The war parts anyway, are pretty much true.")<br />
Pilgrim becomes "unstuck in time", which means he experiences his life not in a linear fashion, but in free-floating flashbacks and flashforwards, traveling back and forth across moments in an already predetermined life. One moment he's being captured by Germans, next he's a successful optometrist. He's a 12 year old boy on a trip out west with his family. He's in a boxcar in Germany. He attends a Lions Club Luncheon. He's abducted by two-foot tall green aliens from the planet Tralfamadore and placed on display under a geodesic dome. He gets married. He's one of two survivors of small plane crash in Vermont. He's in an underground meat locker during the Dresden firebombing. He's assassinated while giving a speech at an optometrist's convention. The war ends. He hears a birdsong. <br />
Early on in the book, Billy writes a series of letters to the local newspaper detailing his experience on Tralfamadore, whose inhabitants experience time in four dimensions:<br />
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<i> The most important thing I learned on Tralfamadore was that when a person dies he only <u>appears </u>to die. He is still very much alive in the past, so it is very silly for people to cry at his funeral. All moments, past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist. The Tralfamadorians can look at all the different moments just the way we can look at a stretch of the Rocky Mountains, for instance. They can see how permanent all the moments are, and they can look at any moment that interests them. It is just an illusion we have here on Earth that one moment follows another, like beads on a string, and that once a moment is gone it is gone forever.</i><br />
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<i><br /></i><b>6. "Everything Is Infinitely Long Ago, Everything Is Infinitely Long in Coming..."</b><br />
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I've spent the last two months sheltering-in-place with four people: my wife, my son, my daughter, and Victor Klemperer. My kids spend a lot of time in their rooms, my wife in a makeshift office in the basement. But I haven't been alone. Through two volumes of over 1,000 small print, densely packed pages ranging over 13 years of his life, Klemperer has been my constant companion. I've been awed by his courage and persistence, infuriated by his indecision, intellectual pretension, and naïveté, and confused by his ambivalent attitude towards Judaism and outright hostility towards Zionism. I've laughed at his comical attempts at learning how to drive, and rolled my eyes at his constant health complaints. I saw the city through his eyes, first driving in his car, then riding in a tram when he was forced to give up his car, then on foot when he was no longer permitted to ride public transportation. I attended funerals with him at the Jewish cemetery, shoveled snow and assembled cardboard boxes with him on forced labor details, stood in food lines with him, spent a week in solitary confinement with him in a Dresden jail cell, and stood by helplessly while his apartment was searched by the Gestapo. I watched Eva sew a yellow star on his jacket, saw former friends and colleagues cross to the other side of the street when he walked by. I heard the humiliating taunts and slurs, and the wailing and the crying as, first one at a time, then in large groups, the Jewish residents of the Dresden ghetto disappeared. Then I heard the air-raid siren.<br />
Real news was hard to come by in the Dresden ghetto, in all Germany for that matter. The Nazi propaganda machine saw to that. And rumors were rampant, many of them false. (One, for example, was that Churchill's aunt was buried in Dresden and as such the city would be spared destruction.) Hard to come by, but not impossible. Klemperer records in his diary (September 14, 1944) an evening in which a friend finds a copy of an old newspaper with a page summarizing events of the previous year. They are wonderstruck by the tumultuous sweep of the world history they had so recently lived through, and find themselves overcome with a strange sensation:<br />
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...s<i>omething else made a greater impression on us--it was the same for both Neumark and myself: the impotence of memory to fix all that we had so painfully experienced in time. When--insofar as we remembered it at all--had this or that happened, when had it been? Only a few facts stick in the mind, dates not at all. One is overwhelmed by the present, time is not divided up, everything is infinitely long ago, everything is infinitely long in coming; there is no yesterday, no tomorrow, only an eternity. </i><br />
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<b>7. "One Long Mobius Strip of Time..."</b><br />
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<b> </b><i>Among the many casualties of Covid-19 is our perception of time. Without jobs or classes, weekdays and weekends blur into one long Mobius strip of time, spent in gym clothes we no longer wear to the gym. Unable to make plans (travel plans, business plans, wedding plans, even lunch plans), we are forced to live in a continuous present. And yet, some days we feel we've been transported to a world imagined in a futuristic novel-- ...other days, we find ourselves in a time warp defined by old movies, old TV series...and reruns of classic sports games.</i><br />
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<i> </i>Michiko Kakutani</div>
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<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/05/books/review/coronavirus-new-york-life-michiko-kakutani.html">"Pandemic Notebook"</a></div>
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The New York Times Book Review</div>
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May 17, 2020</div>
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All this happened, more or less. In the summer of 1989 I worked as a head counselor at a day camp out on the east end of Long Island. I was still single, three years into my teaching career, spending another summer at my parents beach house picking up some extra money. There were a bunch famous people's kids there. Chris Jennings (son of the late ABC World News Tonight anchor Peter Jennings) was in my group, as was Kurt Vonnegut's daughter, Lily. She had been adopted as an infant by Vonnegut (then sixty years old) and his second wife, photographer and author Jill Krementz. She must have been nine or ten that summer, which would put Vonnegut around 70.<br />
I was a Vonnegut fan. Reading him had been a formative adolescent experience, and although in adulthood I'd kind of put him aside, his books had always maintained a special place on my shelf and in my heart. So when I learned that his daughter would be in my group, I was excited. He'd show up maybe once or twice a week to pick her up, unmistakable with his thick moustache and bushy head of hair. Early on in the summer I had gone back to my townhouse in New Jersey to pick up my first edition copy of <u>Breakfast of Champions,</u> with the intention of asking him to sign it. I kept the book in my car, waiting for the opportunity, but every time I saw him I chickened out.<br />
It wasn't until mid-August, the last week of camp, that I got up the nerve to approach him. Time was running out. One afternoon during pick-up, book in hand, I asked him politely if he might sign it for me. Without comment he took it and began to walk away, maybe 30 or 40 yards or so, to a bench under the shade of big tree near the camp's main building. He motioned for me to follow. We sat together on the bench, just a few feet apart. He declined my pen, took out one of his own from a jacket pocket, opened the book, and began to write. He sat there writing for what seemed like a long time, anyway much longer than it would take to just sign his name. I studied his face, not daring to look at the book. What was he doing? I couldn't imagine.<br />
After what seemed like an eternity he got up, smiled, and handed the book back to me. I stammered a nervous thank you. He collected Lily, and the two of them went on their way. Camp ended, and I never saw him again.<br />
I'm looking at the book now, a soon-to-be 59 year old man in the Covid-19 spring of 2020, trying to remember exactly what I did yesterday, and trying to figure out what I'm supposed to be doing today, tomorrow, and all the days after that. And I'm also thinking back to that August afternoon in 1989. I was 28 years old then, six years older than Kurt Vonnegut was when he climbed out of the meat locker in Dresden, Germany on that Valentine's Day in 1945; only four years younger than Victor Klemperer was on that same day, a day when, wandering around a city in flames, on a continent in ruin, he met a man who would forever capture the moment in a strange kind of amber, a man who, like him, would bear witness.<br />
A continuous present, a future world imagined, a time warp into the past.<br />
I bring you greetings from the planet Tralfamadore.<br />
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-14457382383589659372020-04-10T07:08:00.000-07:002020-04-13T13:48:00.401-07:00How One Experiences History<b style="text-align: right;"><i>August 11, Sunday (1935)</i></b><br />
<i> The feeling stronger every day for weeks now, it cannot go on like this much longer. And yet it does go on and on.</i><br />
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victor_Klemperer">Victor Klemperer</a></div>
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<u><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Will-Bear-Witness-Diary-1933-1941-ebook/dp/B01AQNZQ0E/ref=sr_1_1?crid=WDHZBRA8YTHN&dchild=1&keywords=i+will+bear+witness+diary+of+nazi+years+1933-1941&qid=1586465977&s=books&sprefix=i+will+bear+%2Cstripbooks%2C142&sr=1-1">I Will Bear Witness: A Diary of the Nazi Years: 1933-1941</a></u></div>
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When the Nazis took power in Germany in 1933, Victor Klemperer was a professor of Romance Languages at the Technical University of Dresden. Born in 1881 to a Jewish family, he converted to Christianity, married an Aryan woman, and served in the German Army in World War I. He considered himself fully and completely German in every way. Didn't matter. According to the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws">Nuremberg Laws</a> he was Jewish, and now a state subject with no citizenship rights.<br />
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<b>March 30, Thursday (1933)</b><br />
<i> In fact I feel shame more than fear, shame for Germany. I have truly always felt German. I have always imagined: The twentieth century and Mitteleuropa was different from the fourteenth century and Romania. Mistake.</i><br />
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Klemperer (first cousin of the conductor Otto Klemperer) was a writer and a diarist, and his journals were published in 1995. The ones covering the Nazi years are now standard primary sources for historians researching daily life in the Third Reich. In the first volume, which covers the years 1935-1941, Klemperer recounts in excruciating detail the incremental erosion of his way of life: the loss of his job and the drastic reduction of his pension, the confiscation of his house and the move to the Dresden ghetto, the loss of his car and his phone, the loss of Jewish friends to emigration, deportation, jail, and suicide and gentile friends to fear of association, the loss of his freedom of movement, even the loss of his typewriter. The curfews. The stores where he can no longer shop. The doctors he can no longer see. The ration coupons. The taunts on the streets. The ever increasing restrictions, indignities, and humiliations. The tightening of the noose around his neck. <br />
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<b><i>June 13, Wednesday (1934)</i></b></div>
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<i> And on every side consistent reports about the tremendous lack of money. ...In addition, the constant rumors of war. Everywhere uncertainty, ferment, secrets. We live from day to day. </i></div>
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<i> </i>The two volume set of Klemperer's diaries has sat unread on my shelf for at least ten years, probably more like fifteen. I bought them used ($6.00 each) at book sale. Two reasons compelled me to pick Volume One up a few weeks ago: 1) I'm working on a project involving a diary from the year 1926 that my grandmother kept when she was 17 and I wanted to read a diary, and 2) the coronavirus. What's it like to live through a time of uncertainty, fear, and societal disruption? I thought, maybe a little perspective will help. I mean, what we're living through now can't possibly be worse than living through the rise of the Third Reich.<br />
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<b>December 2 (1935)</b><br />
<i>Today it occurred to me: Never has the tension between human power and powerlessness, human knowledge and human stupidity been so overwhelmingly great as now. </i><br />
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Reading Klemperer's diary is like watching the replay of a train wreck, but in slow motion. It's painful to read because he's recording in real time what we already know <i>has</i> happened, and speculating on what we already know<i> will </i>happen. (Although he has reasons for staying in Germany, I frequently found myself yelling at him, "Get out! Now!") He debates emigrating, but by the time he decides to leave it's too late. The conversations he has with his friends and acquaintances, especially in those first years of the Third Reich, are heartbreaking. They alternately look for any reason to feel optimistic (he tries tracking popular sentiment by keeping count of how many people greet each other with "Heil Hitler" and/or the Sieg Heil salute vs. how many with just "good morning" or "good day") and then descend into depression and fatalism. They remind me of the conversations <i>we've</i> had, and are still having today, about the uncertainty of <i>our</i> future. And I find myself thinking: What will someone in the future reading a diary that details what's going on now think? That we were naive? Brave? Smart? Doomed? Delusional? Will they be yelling at <i>us</i>? Will they be proud of what we did or ashamed and embarrassed? Are we headed for a train wreck and we just don't know it? Or have we averted disaster in time? </div>
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<b><i>September 11, Sunday (1938)</i></b></div>
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<i><b> </b>If I talk to the butcher or the butter man here in Dresden, then there will certainly be peace, but if (as the day before yesterday) I listen to Wolf, the car man, then, "Things are coming to a head now!" If I read the newspaper, see and hear the film reports, then we're doing sooo well, we love the Fuhrer soo much and sooo unanimously---what is real, what is happening? That's how one experiences history. We know even less about today than about yesterday and no more than about tomorrow.</i></div>
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<i> </i><i> </i>Although I've yet to start Volume Two, I know what happens to Klemperer. Two of only a handful left in the Dresden ghetto, he and his wife Eva flee the city during the Allied firebombing in February, 1945. They join a refugee column and escape to American controlled territory. He remains in what becomes East Germany, and continues his career as a respected and honored academic until his death in 1960. He was one of the very few who made it through the inferno. Europe, and the world, changed forever. </div>
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What about us? Most immediately, how many of us won't make it? How many will be permanently scarred? What will the economic consequences be? And: How does it end? How do we know when it's over? What will our world be like after? What will we have learned about ourselves? What about next time?<br />
A few weeks ago my daughter asked if this was going to be in the history books.<br />
"It's going to be its own chapter!" I told her. "You're going to be telling your grandchildren about this."<br />
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<b>July 9, toward evening (1941)</b></div>
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<i> Perhaps, probably, it is the greatest good fortune to experience so much world history. But shall we survive it?</i><br />
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I thought I knew a lot about this history. Most Jews grow up learning about what happened in Germany when the Nazis took over. Turns out there was a lot of stuff I didn't know. Little details. Like you weren't allowed to own pets. (Klemperer goes to a vet to have their tomcat Muschel euthanized.) Like when you were relocated to the ghetto and your house was turned over to someone else, you still had to pay the property taxes as well as for repairs and improvements. (The greengrocer is given Klemperer's house and he has to cover the cost of a new roof.) Like when the Nazis ordered you to wear the yellow star, when you went to pick it up you had to pay for it yourself.</div>
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<b><i>September 18 (1941), Thursday evening</i></b></div>
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<i> The "Jewish star," black on yellow cloth, at the center in Hebrew-like lettering "Jew," to be worn on the left breast, large as the palm of a hand, issued to us yesterday for 10 pfennigs, to be worn from tomorrow. ...For the time being at least Eva will take over all the shopping, I shall breathe in a little fresh air only under the shelter of darkness.</i><br />
<i> Today we were outside together in daylight for the last time.</i><br />
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May we all see daylight again soon. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eva and Victor Klemperer, 1940.</td></tr>
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-60605686412220763692020-03-26T07:52:00.002-07:002020-03-26T08:39:59.843-07:00A New Favorite Something I've been carrying around in a folder for years finally got a trial run this past winter in one of the grade 2 classrooms I visit, and it was a big hit. Lifted from the Georgia Frameworks (you can find a detailed lesson plan, directions, and game sheets in <a href="https://www.georgiastandards.org/Georgia-Standards/Pages/Math-K-5.aspx">Grade 2, Unit 1, pgs. 80-89</a>), it's called <i>Capture the Caterpillar</i>, and if I can make any sort of contribution during this current crisis, it's an activity I'd highly recommend. It will work just as well at home as it does in the classroom.<br />
<i>Capture the Caterpillar </i>combines place value, comparing numbers, addition and subtraction, number sense, and strategy as you attempt to get as close to a target number as possible. All you need are:<br />
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<li>A deck of cards (10s and face cards removed, though Queens can be 0s)</li>
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<li>A game sheet and a score sheet </li>
<li>Counters or anything that can stand in as counters, such as beans, paper clips, etc.</li>
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Here's how it works:</div>
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<li>Pick two cards and generate a target number. In the example above either 28 or 82; I chose 28.</li>
<li>Roll two dice. Find the sum. Take that many counters. I rolled a 3 and a 2 and that makes 5, so I took 5 counters. </li>
<li>Place the counters in the caterpillar and try to get as close to 28 as possible. You can place them anywhere you want, but you need to use them all. </li>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Here I made 14. 1 ten and 4 ones. That's 14 away from 28.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">23. 2 tens and 3 ones. That's 5 away. Closer... but can we do better?</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">32. 3 tens and 2 ones. How far away from 28? Is this the closest we can get? How do you know?<br />
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In the above example, 32 is the closest number to 28 we can make given the 5 counters. We would score 4 points because the difference between 32 and 28 is 4. Play as many rounds as you like (in the game it's 5) and try to get the lowest score possible.<br />
Here are two second graders playing this game. Their target number is 22 and they have 9 counters. Pay attention to how they collaborate; how they count, how they determine the differences between their numbers, how they talk through the rules, how they plot strategy:<br />
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Here's a completed scoresheet:<br />
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Two more versions:<br />
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Some notes:<br />
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<li>The Georgia Frameworks include only the 100s and 1000s caterpillars. Honestly, it's been so long I'm not sure where the 10s caterpillar came from. I can't find it on either the new (2019) or older (2014) edition of the Frameworks. Did I do a cut and paste job and make it myself? <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/10JTVWHagNL33-NeTfZ6CbeXot1gKNutDungswAcdPho/edit?usp=sharing"> Here's the image in a google doc.</a> Or you can make your own. Better yet, have your kids make it! (Actually you don't even need the caterpillars. Just circles will do.) </li>
<li>The scoresheet in the Frameworks has a column for expanded form. We eliminated that column and replaced it with a column to indicate the difference between the two numbers. <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_NTTMYGXX4jOwXpicEdt2FV-KKIOit2v3DkafJrf51U/edit">Here it is.</a> We were about to experiment with having the kids plot their target numbers along with their attempts on a number line, but never got the chance. </li>
<li>An alternative to competing against another individual or team is competing against your (or the class's) best score. I like that better anyway. </li>
<li>For a change, try to make the number that's <i>farthest </i>away from the target number and try for the <i>highest</i> score possible.</li>
<li>Try it with 3 dice. </li>
<li>Forget drawing cards and trying to get close to a target. Instead roll the dice, grab counters, and see how many different numbers you can make. Is there a systematic way to go about the task? Is there a relationship between the number of counters and the number of different numbers you can make? </li>
<li> One possible assignment: take a picture of a set up and ask students to come up with the closest/farthest number possible. This is a good number sense routine.</li>
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My hope is that this activity can be used by parents working with their children at home and teachers working virtually with their students. I can only imagine what it must be like for all those trying their best to continue to provide meaningful educational experiences for their kids right now. Know that, when all is said and done, you will be counted among the many heroes who held our society together during this most difficult and challenging time. </div>
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<br />Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-26539784925927717732020-03-01T07:24:00.004-08:002020-03-01T07:24:38.537-08:00Math Class Needs A Makeover Turns Ten Ten years ago this month, on March 6, 2010, a tall man in a maroon sweater vest gave a Ted Talk. It clocked in at 11 minutes and 24 seconds. Here's how he described what he did for a living:<br />
"I sell a product to a market that doesn't want it but is forced by law to buy it. I mean, it's just a losing proposition."<br />
He called the talk <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_meyer_math_class_needs_a_makeover?language=en">"Math Class Needs a Makeover."</a> His name was Dan Meyer. He was a high school math teacher, and he was tired of losing.<br />
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How long does it take to change your life? I remember exactly where I was the first time I saw it. Sitting at my computer in Room 10A, in that elementary school somewhere off the New Jersey Turnpike, I was an unlikely math specialist with a <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/08/my-confession-part-1-i-undergo.html">very conflicted relationship to the subject</a>, searching for something, anything, that might make a difference in the lives of the basic skills kids I was supposed to be helping. What I saw took my breath away. Here was an actual math teacher giving voice to and validating everything I felt was wrong about math instruction while showing a way forward. It was a manifesto. It was a challenge. And, for me, it was nothing short of revelatory. From there it was a few mouse clicks to <a href="https://blog.mrmeyer.com/">his blog</a>, which I devoured, anxiously awaiting each new post, and his "Blogulty Lounge", where I discovered the work of <a href="https://twitter.com/mr_stadel">Andrew Stadel</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/fawnpnguyen">Fawn Nguyen</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/mpershan">Michael Pershan</a>, among others. (I'll admit here for the first time that it was <i>years</i> before I got the pun: of course an online Faculty Lounge was a Blogulty Lounge.) I began to experiment with ideas I found in this new online universe in the K-5 classrooms in my school and, in emulation, started my own blog as a way to record and reflect on that work. How long does it take to change your life? 11 minutes and 24 seconds.</div>
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Ten years, 33 languages, and over 2,800,000 views later, "Math Class Needs A Makeover" is as powerful and important today as it was then. Will we ever truly be able to measure its influence? One of the very first comments on the talk came from a 17 year old named Timo Bronseth. He wrote:</div>
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"By the time Meyer's idea has overthrown our school system, maybe I'll be teaching it!" </div>
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Timo's now 27. I'd like to imagine he's out there somewhere, doing a 3-act task with his class, trying to overthrow the system.<br />
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-49611752918404041192019-09-23T14:36:00.000-07:002019-09-23T14:36:01.421-07:00Houston, 1964<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i> If I appear to be asking too many questions and not providing any answers, I am merely trying to convey the flavor of MSC ( the Manned Spacecraft Center) in 1964, when we had a mandate to fly to the moon but few hard facts with which to work. It was primarily a question-asking operation at this stage, defining those things which needed answers...</i><br />
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<i> </i>Michael Collins</div>
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<u>Carrying the Fire,</u> p. 67<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Michael Collins before his flight on Gemini 10, July, 1966</td></tr>
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For my money, the best part of a 3-Act task is Act 2. After the focus question has been established, but before any math work has been done, Act 2 is where students need to ask the teacher for the information they'll need in order to solve the problem. It's crucial to the entire enterprise: if the right questions aren't asked the key information will not be provided and the problem will remain unsolved. For students used to being given all the information they need embedded within the problem (<i>Johnny has 3 apples. Billy has 4 apples. How many apples do they have in all?) </i>understanding what information might be useful, and then asking for it, isn't always easy. But the skill is all-important.<br />
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Collins_(astronaut)">Michael Collins </a>is best known as the astronaut who <i>didn't </i>land on the moon (he orbited while Armstrong and Aldrin made the first crewed landing on its surface). Caught up in the excitement this past summer surrounding the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, I read his book <u><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_the_Fire">Carrying the Fire</a>,</u> in which he describes his experiences as an Air Force pilot, his astronaut training, and his flights aboard Gemini 10 and Apollo 11. It's compulsively readable and highly recommended!<br />
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I didn't realize just what an incredible accomplishment it was to put a man on the moon until I read Collins's book. The lives sacrificed (of the fourteen candidates chosen along with Collins in the third astronaut cohort, four would die in training accidents, as well as Grissom, White, and Chaffee in the Apollo 1 cabin fire), the money, resources, time and expertise dedicated to the mission; in 2019 it's hard to imagine our country uniting behind a project of that magnitude. </div>
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Like a 3-Act task, the project started with an Act 1 focus question: How do we put a man on the moon before the end of the (1960s) decade? Then came the complicated part: What do we need to know in order to accomplish the goal? Well, start asking questions. And remember, one unasked question could put the entire enterprise in jeopardy, so, no pressure.<br />
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Collins's book has questions on nearly every page. There are way too many to list them all, but here's a <i>very</i> small sample:</div>
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<li>Would the possible thickness of the dust layer on the moon exceed the height of the lunar module? </li>
<li>Would the static electricity on the lunar module cause the dust to adhere to the lander, obscuring the astronauts' view?</li>
<li>How much fuel would be required for a rendezvous and docking around the moon?</li>
<li>What would the temperature be in the spacecraft during the constant sunlight on the way to the moon?</li>
<li>What would be the effect of weightlessness on body functions?</li>
<li>Could a guidance system find its way to the moon and and back again?</li>
<li>If the spacecraft experienced communications failure, would the astronauts be able to take over navigational responsibilities? How accurately would they be able to measure the angle between a selected star and the moon's or earth's horizon?</li>
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<i> In 1964 in Houston a lot of answers had to be provided before any rational person could assess the chance of success.</i></div>
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Those questions were answered in test chambers, in flying simulators, in labs and factories and classrooms, on computers and chalkboards and notebooks, and in the data collected from each successive space flight, starting with the first Project Mercury flight on May 5, 1961 through Project Gemini, and culminating with the Apollo 11 flight, July 16-24, 1969. Before the end of the decade.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Collins (center) flanked by Armstrong (left) and Aldrin (right) in quarantine after Apollo 11 splashdown, July 24, 1969.</td></tr>
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Only a select few had the ability and the talent to be able to answer questions like the ones that needed answering on our way to the moon. Brilliant mathematicians, engineers, physicists, geologists, and doctors crunched the numbers and solved the equations, collected and interpreted the data. Once given the necessary information, not every student is going to be able to come up with a solution in Act 3 of a 3-Act task. Am I interested in that? Yes. But I'm more interested in Act 2: What questions did you ask? What information do you think you need to know? And remember, one unasked question could put the entire enterprise in jeopardy. </div>
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<i> If I could use only one word to describe the earth as seen from the moon, I would ignore both its size and its color and search for a more elemental quality, that of fragility. The earth appears "fragile" above all else. I don't know why, but it does. As we walk its surface, it seems solid and substantial enough, almost infinite as it extends flatly in all directions. But from space there is no hint of ruggedness to it; smooth as a billiard ball, it seems delicately poised in its circular journey around the sun, and above all it seems fragile. Once this concept of apparent earthly fragility is introduced, one questions whether it is real or imagined, and that leads inexorably to an examination of its surface. There we find things are very fragile indeed. Is the sea water clean enough to pour over your head, or is there a glaze of oil on its surface? Is the sky blue and the cloud white, or are both obscured by yellow-brown air-borne filth? Is the riverbank a delight or an obscenity? The difference between a blue-and-white planet and a black-and-brown one is delicate indeed.</i></div>
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<i> ....The beauty of the planet from 100,000 miles should be a goal for all of us, to help in our struggle to make it as it appears to be.</i></div>
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<u>Carrying the Fire,</u> pgs. 471-472</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Michael Collins, July, 2019</td></tr>
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-87144907296602212402019-08-08T09:26:00.000-07:002019-09-05T05:39:35.183-07:00The Earth Appears Fragile Above All Else<br />
<i> Inspired by the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, I read <u><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrying_the_Fire">Carrying the Fire</a></u>, Michael Collins's compelling, funny, honest account of his astronaut training and experiences aboard both the Gemini 10 and historic Apollo 11 space flights. </i><i>He had no ghostwriter; every word is his own. </i><i>Here are some excerpts. </i><i>I put them in verse (and added titles) because they just seemed like poetry to me. </i><br />
<i> Hope he doesn't mind.</i><br />
<i><b><br /></b></i>
<i><b>Only One Word</b></i><br />
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<b>If I could use only one word to describe the earth as seen from the moon</b><br />
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<b>I would ignore both its size and its color</b></div>
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<b>and search for a more elemental quality, that of</b></div>
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<b>fragility.</b></div>
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<b>The earth appears</b></div>
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<b>fragile</b></div>
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<b>above all else.</b></div>
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<b>I don't know why but it does.</b></div>
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<b>As we walk its surface, it seems solid and substantial enough,</b></div>
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<b>almost infinite </b></div>
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<b>as it extends flatly in all directions.</b></div>
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<b>But from space</b></div>
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<b>there is no hint of raggedness to it;</b></div>
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<b>smooth as a billiard ball,</b></div>
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<b>it seems delicately poised </b></div>
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<b>in its circular journey around the sun,</b></div>
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<b>and above all</b></div>
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<b>it seems</b></div>
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<b>fragile.</b><br />
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<b><i>Carrying the Fire</i></b><br />
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<b>I have been places and done things you simply would not believe, </b></div>
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<b>I feel like saying;</b></div>
<b>I have dangled from a cord a hundred miles up;</b><br />
<b>I have seen the earth eclipsed by the moon, and enjoyed it.</b><br />
<b>I have seen the sun's true light, unfiltered by any planet's atmosphere.</b><br />
<b>I have seen the ultimate black of infinity in a stillness undisturbed </b><br />
<b> by any human being.</b><br />
<b>I have been pierced by cosmic rays on their endless journey from God's place</b><br />
<b> to the limits of the universe,</b><br />
<b> perhaps there to circle back on themselves</b><br />
<b> and on my descendants. </b><br />
<b> ...Although</b><br />
<b>I have no intention of spending the rest of my life looking backward</b><br />
<b> I do have this secret, </b><br />
<b> this precious thing,</b><br />
<b> that I will always carry with me.</b><br />
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<b><i><br /></i></b>
<b><i>What Any Pilot Knows Is the Most Useless Measurement</i></b><br />
<b><i><br /></i></b>
<b>any pilot knows</b><br />
<b>from ready-room fable </b><br />
<b>or bitter experience</b><b> that</b><br />
<b>the length of the runway behind him is the most useless measurement he can take;</b><br />
<b>it's what's up ahead that matters.</b><br />
<b>We know we cannot dwell </b><br />
<b>on those good things that have already happened,</b><br />
<b>but must keep our minds one step ahead, </b><br />
<b>especially now,</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgeOaRrYg4kz7kHwObBc4VRN2yu9nAQEo6TZn6x427KuAitHcZ0cFvCdn7jv12spNyvExuwgGCf9b5A0Aop3XTgT9XLLoCccOy41DzkNIsOJ6_cckwslEMYD9s8bmt14u9SMqDPZHmop0/s1600/Screen+Shot+2019-08-07+at+12.36.08+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="946" data-original-width="1204" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgeOaRrYg4kz7kHwObBc4VRN2yu9nAQEo6TZn6x427KuAitHcZ0cFvCdn7jv12spNyvExuwgGCf9b5A0Aop3XTgT9XLLoCccOy41DzkNIsOJ6_cckwslEMYD9s8bmt14u9SMqDPZHmop0/s200/Screen+Shot+2019-08-07+at+12.36.08+PM.png" width="200" /></a></div>
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b><i>In Memoriam: </i><br />
<i>MDW</i><br />
<i>June 16, 1961-November 16, 2002</i><br />
<i>His humor, courage and character are indelible, </i><br />
<i>like footprints on the moon.</i><br />
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<i> </i>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-2169997949217047712018-11-01T13:06:00.003-07:002018-11-01T13:06:54.428-07:00"All in All, a Pleasant and Educationally Sound Experience for the Children."<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
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do you remember the first math lesson you taught in your career? what did you teach? what did you learn? what would you tell your rookie self now? <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/mtbos?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#mtbos</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/iteachmath?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#iteachmath</a></div>
— chase orton (@mathgeek76) <a href="https://twitter.com/mathgeek76/status/1052332527602425858?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 16, 2018</a></blockquote>
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OK, not the first math lesson I taught, but pretty darn close:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM5yW50ZZJrSjW7-MRV7ith-vOfeGr9rXvx6dHqUE63Tua46gtHIraGNgYWe6Hp7CvmkBAgEGLQXmJQyQzmpqfhzFSMIBRmMBtlrDUQ_ESwwKceeQmsaWrHDUHEk6wtwN1fUcq-wxs0HQ/s1600/IMG_0470.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="937" data-original-width="1600" height="372" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgM5yW50ZZJrSjW7-MRV7ith-vOfeGr9rXvx6dHqUE63Tua46gtHIraGNgYWe6Hp7CvmkBAgEGLQXmJQyQzmpqfhzFSMIBRmMBtlrDUQ_ESwwKceeQmsaWrHDUHEk6wtwN1fUcq-wxs0HQ/s640/IMG_0470.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">December 17, 1986</td></tr>
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At the time this lesson took place, I had been teaching for about 3 1/2 months. The administrator conducting the observation was Dr. Frank Gardella, the district's math supervisor. (Frank, who would soon leave East Brunswick, is now a <a href="https://education.hunter.cuny.edu/about/faculty-staff/frank-gardella/">professor at Hunter College in New York City</a>. Years later we would reconnect during some <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/07/summer-in-new-jersey-or-what-in-world.html">summer PD at Middlesex County College</a>.)<br />
Even after reading the write-up, I'm not exactly sure what happened during this lesson. Did it come out of a teacher's manual? If not, where did it come from? Did I make it up? Clearly it was aimed at developing the relationship between addition and subtraction. Unifix cubes were handed out. I tried to connect my students' ideas of what <i>related </i>meant in their lives (family relations) to what it might mean for addition and subtraction equations. Best I can tell I led the students through some direct modeling with addition facts with sums of 14, matching them to subtraction facts with a minuend of 14, and then did the same with addition facts with sums of 13. The unifix cubes were used. I modeled what I wanted on a piece of chart paper and the kids followed my lead at their seats on paper of their own. It appears that this took 22 minutes. Then we played a game of "practice races" for 10 minutes. Finally I collected the unifix cubes and gave a homework sheet.<br />
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Here are Frank's comments:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKpeyCoIMQpTqH2AYGXyREGD-SdWkVfNlFA9Ap3C1BjTmaOBt7-tLm2IFs3QwEiDqVTytiWQ51HQojJGLYDNxWdWd5CzjbLsJD8MCZLv0xZ4LJh51IqD9O4H9dxLNWCqNm_VXH7NyvSzw/s1600/IMG_0469.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="928" data-original-width="1600" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKpeyCoIMQpTqH2AYGXyREGD-SdWkVfNlFA9Ap3C1BjTmaOBt7-tLm2IFs3QwEiDqVTytiWQ51HQojJGLYDNxWdWd5CzjbLsJD8MCZLv0xZ4LJh51IqD9O4H9dxLNWCqNm_VXH7NyvSzw/s640/IMG_0469.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A kind, humane administrator is a blessing for any teacher, first year or otherwise.<br />
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What might I tell my "rookie self"? What might I do differently?<br />
<ul>
<li>The lesson was very teacher directed. Now, as an intro, I might throw up some related facts on the board and ask: <i>What do you notice? What are you wondering? </i>Allow the kids to do more of the mathematizing.</li>
<li>I liked that I used unifix cubes. But now I would let them explore on their own, in pairs or groups of three. Maybe something like: <i>Take 13 unifix cubes. How many different addition and subtraction equations can you make? </i>Then I might walk around and monitor their work, and find some related equations that I could use as examples. <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2018/10/in-memory-of-overhead-projector.html">(How did we do that in 1986?)</a> After consolidating some of the learning, I would give them a choice of using any number up to 20. </li>
<li>I'm not sure what "practice races" are, but I feel confident I wouldn't be doing those.</li>
<li>I need a better closure. Collecting cubes and giving a homework sheet doesn't cut it. Maybe: <i>Tell me everything you can about: 6 + 5 = 11 and 11 - 5 = 6</i></li>
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<i> </i>Some other thoughts:</div>
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<li>As a first year teacher, I was fortunate to have, in addition to Frank Gardella, some very supportive administrators. For example my principal, Mike LaRaus. I'll never forget what he told me back on my first first day of school, that September of 1986. I showed up at like 6:00 AM, after a sleepless night, nervous as anything. He found me, near paralyzed in my classroom. He told me it was normal to feel that way, that I would always get that feeling on the first day of school. Then he said, "Just relax and do your thing. No one's going to bother you. I'm not even going to set foot in your classroom for the first two weeks of school, and neither will any other administrator. Get your footing and then we'll talk." I can't tell you how relieved that made me feel. Thanks, Mike!</li>
<li>Are you surprised I have a copy of the evaluation? I have them all. Every single one I received during my 31 years of teaching. What strikes me is how bare bones it is. Three pages. The two narrative paragraphs above, the first on page 1 and the second on page 3, with a checklist of performance practices, from Exceeds Expectations through Not Observed, on page 2. The <i>last</i> formal observation I received was on January 31, 2017, and it came to me via e-mail. I printed it out. It's 14 pages long. No wonder Frank left.</li>
<li>It's interesting to think back to the 25 year-old, first year teacher that I was. Yes I was nervous at first, but I was also a little cocky. I thought I knew a lot more than I really did. (Now I know I don't know all that much.) Also, I was a bit stand-offish. (If you don't believe me, ask my wife.) In time I learned how to be a good colleague; a supportive and sharing grade-level teammate and a helpful and contributing member of the staff and the wider school community. That is to say, I grew up.</li>
<li> I'm spending a lot of time this year coaching first year teachers. They're brand new, right out of college. Many of them have wanted to be teachers since they were kids, when they'd spend hours in their rooms "playing school". Now their dreams have become realities. They're nervous and excited, overwhelmed and overworked, and stressed out. I love them. I want so much to help them, to make their lives a little less stressful. To let them know that they're doing a good job. They're not much older than my own kids, and when I sit with them and talk to them I think about how I'd want someone in a position of authority to treat <i>my</i> son and daughter when <i>they</i> are just starting out in <i>their</i> first jobs. Frank could've torn the lesson apart, but he didn't. (Maybe he <i>did</i> think it was a "good lesson!" Maybe he saved his real criticism for our post-observation meeting. I don't recall.) But I didn't yell at anyone, didn't make anyone feel stupid; I wasn't sarcastic or intolerant. He recognized that. My issues were with pedagogy and instruction, and those things can be improved with time, patience, and a desire to work at getting better at the craft. I'm still trying to get better.</li>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My first class.</td></tr>
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-2616454881048474132018-10-18T15:02:00.001-07:002018-10-18T15:02:29.018-07:00In Memory of the Overhead Projector In schools all over America there are overhead projector graveyards.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJlyzQDVsNpl1dBQXObPjExP8ZTBK1UFxBFj07-2vk9q4GlPckOjXD8ofiyBPdjfp5yr5T9dW4KgsTluEPVR0UrFSpTY8zRpmZIQK7JH5Yjl3hwKbgchcyvabPJDalCXhBJTAPs5lbFiI/s1600/junked.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="375" data-original-width="500" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJlyzQDVsNpl1dBQXObPjExP8ZTBK1UFxBFj07-2vk9q4GlPckOjXD8ofiyBPdjfp5yr5T9dW4KgsTluEPVR0UrFSpTY8zRpmZIQK7JH5Yjl3hwKbgchcyvabPJDalCXhBJTAPs5lbFiI/s400/junked.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Quick, save one to put in the Museum of Outdated EdTech!</td></tr>
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When I first started teaching, these projectors were invaluable.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY0gZx-cTxKeRkTbuUNX75m1eodINKnBUcneP8Fjh2L0JSXafuECperFuktChaRKuTGrmnzPUJfGWZ3HmFoITeinWR4dWIfhYrE2GMTZGXFwDhbAs6X9YYGW0EFYDAtVj2hYBa2ddx7Mo/s1600/overhead-music-projector.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="308" data-original-width="550" height="223" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY0gZx-cTxKeRkTbuUNX75m1eodINKnBUcneP8Fjh2L0JSXafuECperFuktChaRKuTGrmnzPUJfGWZ3HmFoITeinWR4dWIfhYrE2GMTZGXFwDhbAs6X9YYGW0EFYDAtVj2hYBa2ddx7Mo/s400/overhead-music-projector.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Having one in your room was a status symbol.</td></tr>
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If you wanted to show something to the class, you had to have a transparency. Some programs came with transparencies already made. Awesome! If they didn't, or if you wanted to show a sample of a student's work to the class, you had to make one yourself. Not awesome! You had to put a blank transparency in the paper tray of the copy machine and pray the copier didn't get jammed. It always got jammed. And it was always in the morning, five minutes before the opening bell, with a line of teachers waiting to make copies for <b>their</b> classes, moaning and groaning and giving you the hairy eyeball. Then spreading the news all over the school that it was <b>you</b> who jammed the copy machine, so you'd have to skulk around the hallways all day and maybe even avoid eating lunch in the faculty lounge. Also the bulbs always burned out, often right before you were getting observed doing a lesson that required the overhead projector. Then you had to beg a colleague to borrow theirs, because there was always a shortage of overhead projector bulbs because they cost like hundreds of dollars and didn't get put in the budget. And also because teachers hoarded them. I know this to be true because once a teacher in my building retired and when the new hire came in and looked in the desk there were three brand new unused overhead projector bulbs in the bottom drawer.<br />
Happily, those days are behind us. Behold one of the greatest advances in education in the last half century:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDcxiZF9rxmO1QD5raoHIwKqKOftxxelLfLE8k9A-jPPfmn7ZmTsBd5mK1KVqj83K9T8OgYCYEr4Cr2DH-Rm0mkWwpog9SPmW77e1IrDHl1R-7dhU3Z8yXQ4uQa9TuyRqswHGVG43eM40/s1600/doc+cam.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDcxiZF9rxmO1QD5raoHIwKqKOftxxelLfLE8k9A-jPPfmn7ZmTsBd5mK1KVqj83K9T8OgYCYEr4Cr2DH-Rm0mkWwpog9SPmW77e1IrDHl1R-7dhU3Z8yXQ4uQa9TuyRqswHGVG43eM40/s400/doc+cam.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The document camera.</td></tr>
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We can show anything we want to the class without the hassles of the old overhead projector. A picture in a book, the directions to a game, and, most importantly, student work:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifMZ5D0beGmI4Yd6El9FglTSADqb6iJKMXHmJuNDqA2vRtaXNy77kpG6sqQDosR3P8P0SMHpGtpF_ijJvGMqFPQ08hqCTBnqdVis70H8WE9Tl_ZKtk4CIApn4HGnKoWRbw9vWRXp409LQ/s1600/Screen+Shot+2018-10-14+at+8.31.19+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="334" data-original-width="902" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifMZ5D0beGmI4Yd6El9FglTSADqb6iJKMXHmJuNDqA2vRtaXNy77kpG6sqQDosR3P8P0SMHpGtpF_ijJvGMqFPQ08hqCTBnqdVis70H8WE9Tl_ZKtk4CIApn4HGnKoWRbw9vWRXp409LQ/s640/Screen+Shot+2018-10-14+at+8.31.19+PM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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No longer do we have to wait. We can share the work immediately, in the moment. Imagine implementing the <u><a href="https://www.nctm.org/Store/Products/5-Practices-for-Orchestrating-Productive-Mathematics-Discussion,-2nd-Edition/">5 Practices for Orchestrating Productive Math Discussions</a>.</u> Now imagine having to make transparencies of any student work you wanted to share. Document camera for the win.<br />
Of course many classrooms don't have document cameras. Not to worry; take a picture with your phone's camera:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLd64EZdYI_OpuKPbMm8BxuO9ltx7-IyIN9bcF74uhJShhwoc3eQyfF8QRtueBShdAhR6CRLiQp9EM4GKrPgBDH0eP7q66ELAnG1FZTOUB6Pb6eYSNIdc30fzKaJRUzIsL7POnLezzG4Q/s1600/IMG_0407.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1136" data-original-width="640" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLd64EZdYI_OpuKPbMm8BxuO9ltx7-IyIN9bcF74uhJShhwoc3eQyfF8QRtueBShdAhR6CRLiQp9EM4GKrPgBDH0eP7q66ELAnG1FZTOUB6Pb6eYSNIdc30fzKaJRUzIsL7POnLezzG4Q/s400/IMG_0407.jpg" width="225" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Everybody's got a phone. Email it to yourself, or AirDrop it.</td></tr>
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The overhead has gone the way of the ditto machine, and the opaque and filmstrip projectors. Most teachers today have probably never used one, and if they do remember them, it's from their days as students. And while I will admit to some nostalgia for the calming whirr of the cooling fan and the intimate mood lighting, as well as a touch of sadness at the thought of those once proud machines piled forlornly and haphazardly in the back of a forgotten storage closet, their time has come and gone.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXCmaHAV_Yrj05nM8q9W7G-k41o8vFDD2_TR8gtnhY8WCCwft-mK7c-N-Irc__zuxt39toxYJ3-Tt4QDBc-W1qtSqpiCUZw77moSC9f2bfQcABzsoNrBEHNSd3uc2U4F1HpAq3ylwGxjQ/s1600/IMG_0302.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="671" data-original-width="1600" height="167" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXCmaHAV_Yrj05nM8q9W7G-k41o8vFDD2_TR8gtnhY8WCCwft-mK7c-N-Irc__zuxt39toxYJ3-Tt4QDBc-W1qtSqpiCUZw77moSC9f2bfQcABzsoNrBEHNSd3uc2U4F1HpAq3ylwGxjQ/s400/IMG_0302.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A document camera graveyard??</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-56190557941946370122018-10-14T16:30:00.000-07:002018-10-14T16:30:54.868-07:00Autumn<i><span style="font-size: large;"> The days had become cooler and shorter. The leaves on the trees began to yellow and I saw birds flying in flocks--probably on their way to warmer climates. The nights were colder and longer. I could not sleep and I went outside for a breath of fresh air. There were no more lights coming from the bungalows and the sky was full of stars. God, or whoever He is, was still there, observing his creation. A new theater? A new man? The old idolatry was here again. The stone and clay idols had been exchanged for a Gertrude Stein, a Picasso, a Bernard Shaw, an Ezra Pound. Everybody worshipped culture and progress. I myself had tried to become a priest of this idolatry, although I was aware of its falsehood. At its best, art could be nothing more than a means of forgetting the human disaster for a while. I walked over to the colony. Most of those whose names the bungalows bore had departed this world, with its illusions, forever. Those who worshipped them would soon follow. I lifted up my eyes to the starry sky again and again as if in hope that some revelation might descend upon me from above. I inhaled the cold air and shivered.</span></i><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Isaac Bashevis Singer</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Lost in America</b></span></div>
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<i> </i></div>
Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-53290445762567614112018-09-24T13:58:00.000-07:002018-09-24T13:58:05.321-07:00The D Word In the course of my work with teachers, I'm often asked about a little something called <i>differentiation</i>. Maybe you've heard of it.<br />
They might say something like:<br />
<i> </i><br />
<i> Admin is requiring us to have differentiation options in our lesson plans. What's a good way to account for all the levels of learners in my class?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i> </i>More often than not they won't use the d word. They'll say something along the lines of:<br />
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<i> I've got a lot of low kids in my class. It takes them forever to solve a problem. Some of them can't even read. The high kids finish right away and </i><i>then just sit around and wait while I try to help the others. What can I do?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
When I hear comments like this, I set aside (for the moment) my concerns about labeling learners as high and low. I compliment the teacher on her observation that something is wrong, that not all needs are being met, that precious class time is being wasted, and that she wants to do something about it. But what? <br />
Sometimes teachers will assign certain groups of students certain problems, or adapt assignments, like this:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuhFVrRpG_rTAqcA-RERyvatAjhWpNCkdkgNe2WPVfS07zsBESxRUYkDc1TRm6BGCeyGtrRkc9-7H6Y8Z91ibdDC1lhVTIJ-_fORb_FV4S8unZYURTtvDiPJUozNn9aq_ipm6vXajyuTg/s1600/group+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuhFVrRpG_rTAqcA-RERyvatAjhWpNCkdkgNe2WPVfS07zsBESxRUYkDc1TRm6BGCeyGtrRkc9-7H6Y8Z91ibdDC1lhVTIJ-_fORb_FV4S8unZYURTtvDiPJUozNn9aq_ipm6vXajyuTg/s400/group+1.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQPR4YebgSLh4uLx4Fs30zR8X05Ue-gSLpt2PyV3wzMgVGxDNOBMCXtv6nTlGPL4Z6SgxIQiAgXp3d6yJrlMSnwpLtwjHzIoBBDvsdjHKn7eKzJMT-Ivrcb_pIkq8urR7JUfUEpyUM0lg/s1600/group+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQPR4YebgSLh4uLx4Fs30zR8X05Ue-gSLpt2PyV3wzMgVGxDNOBMCXtv6nTlGPL4Z6SgxIQiAgXp3d6yJrlMSnwpLtwjHzIoBBDvsdjHKn7eKzJMT-Ivrcb_pIkq8urR7JUfUEpyUM0lg/s400/group+2.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhFwkl75Jwq8AJZlk-hzVShXiknjM1Bk8wfyynBdEyKFoDy0TJ5uhS9tLCUvqb1yqWpXhRxg6ZVYuqV8bPi9Maz7JCpx2iXQM_T70jr9xcsJDIsZGW9f0a5Oku7jfQhpGMqnrz8iW676Y/s1600/group+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhFwkl75Jwq8AJZlk-hzVShXiknjM1Bk8wfyynBdEyKFoDy0TJ5uhS9tLCUvqb1yqWpXhRxg6ZVYuqV8bPi9Maz7JCpx2iXQM_T70jr9xcsJDIsZGW9f0a5Oku7jfQhpGMqnrz8iW676Y/s400/group+3.jpg" width="300" /></a></div>
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One common method I've seen employed is dividing students into ability-based groups. Teachers might call this guided math, or math workshop. After a whole-class lesson, the teacher will meet with the so-called struggling students and lead them through the problem set while the "high fliers" work through the problems on their own, and then move on to some game or other activity. If there's time, the students in the teacher-led group may get to play a game. There's rarely enough time.<br />
While I do believe there is a time and place for teachers to meet with small, skill-based groups, too often this model becomes the daily, default structure. The groups calcify, and all the inherent social, emotional, and academic implications manifest themselves. So what's the answer?<br />
Here's a differentiation template that I've used. I take no credit for inventing it, only experimenting with it in some of my elementary classrooms to good effect. I've written about this before, but as we begin the 2018-2019 school year I feel it's a good time for a revisit. It goes like this:<br />
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<b>Step One:</b><br />
<b> </b>Grab a scissors. Take whatever problem you want the kids to solve and remove the question. Keep just the text. If the questions are generated based on a chart or some other graphic, keep just the graphic.<br />
Some examples:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4d75YmWbL0A6IbpoV0tOfydSL0ssO29qZxjJ7Z2KVdcUxSLyaip0bLUR7D0SyzEn6-KG2Ei4eVG9NFtswDulUy6-1q1Qqu24y44puz-XTTTWqiMbW5MtMJnxBCkpnXCL6kBL_Iw-6oN0/s1600/group+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4d75YmWbL0A6IbpoV0tOfydSL0ssO29qZxjJ7Z2KVdcUxSLyaip0bLUR7D0SyzEn6-KG2Ei4eVG9NFtswDulUy6-1q1Qqu24y44puz-XTTTWqiMbW5MtMJnxBCkpnXCL6kBL_Iw-6oN0/s400/group+3.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Before</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihoAhckTn25gKy_lu726d2QouVkf5IfzX0m9rVBhjQPcH_kwD37glPJLSZgEW5jP9Yj5YcNfB64HapLU_RONXuP0Ah_dEFFX-wOslX3XfKUs0_wo1rIkf5xlkgRxZFLq1htKlsAehlfRE/s1600/chart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="979" data-original-width="1600" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihoAhckTn25gKy_lu726d2QouVkf5IfzX0m9rVBhjQPcH_kwD37glPJLSZgEW5jP9Yj5YcNfB64HapLU_RONXuP0Ah_dEFFX-wOslX3XfKUs0_wo1rIkf5xlkgRxZFLq1htKlsAehlfRE/s320/chart.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">After</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYy13ztYIel8wrYU1qEZG0EzOsiEJSfmu5vhU8ChxOsQdUp_U21ZOXZl5zIWp1tAk2GHJAq2YDa9B9CaWFt4GEwjP1hUbzM-mh9nSz28Cfvxkkdh913tsmHxUA6aVeQ55LSbkQp_3dZH8/s1600/original+parcc.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="989" data-original-width="1438" height="273" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYy13ztYIel8wrYU1qEZG0EzOsiEJSfmu5vhU8ChxOsQdUp_U21ZOXZl5zIWp1tAk2GHJAq2YDa9B9CaWFt4GEwjP1hUbzM-mh9nSz28Cfvxkkdh913tsmHxUA6aVeQ55LSbkQp_3dZH8/s400/original+parcc.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Before</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9P7cSkv73dBcyHH5LWeoP77-MkTwNfUnAP4_e2TXQDBbCxs-bdEvUIEoItSA1UDUe2ZdQ4A0kpL_NUHz_3RUckA2B2yZZLojfngXEfHF69nK2EwrPXNz3FIfd0SQCsoHCUvYimEGla5o/s1600/PARCC3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="642" data-original-width="1423" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9P7cSkv73dBcyHH5LWeoP77-MkTwNfUnAP4_e2TXQDBbCxs-bdEvUIEoItSA1UDUe2ZdQ4A0kpL_NUHz_3RUckA2B2yZZLojfngXEfHF69nK2EwrPXNz3FIfd0SQCsoHCUvYimEGla5o/s400/PARCC3.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">After</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<b>Step Two:</b><br />
After a quick notice and wonder, ask the students to write their own questions, questions that can be solved using the information in the prompt. First in their notebooks and then, after vetting, on chart paper. Ask students to vary the question type between <a href="http://reading.ecb.org/downloads/qu_lp_ThickandThinQuestions.pdf">"thin" and "thick" questions</a>.<br />
Some examples:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr1y2E7aqPmDbUjjtmIt9WPO03AbR1vtg5qChHtvfmFY4FRAdbWcCRtcNpt7AurgUYAsNRQd7xmoLicw4oQqRYixLMofO7z8ER8jCifi4socgENb-AQwrKHyoFOPs3G35IsbhI7wRpCvg/s1600/Screen+Shot+2018-09-21+at+4.51.06+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1017" data-original-width="1318" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhr1y2E7aqPmDbUjjtmIt9WPO03AbR1vtg5qChHtvfmFY4FRAdbWcCRtcNpt7AurgUYAsNRQd7xmoLicw4oQqRYixLMofO7z8ER8jCifi4socgENb-AQwrKHyoFOPs3G35IsbhI7wRpCvg/s400/Screen+Shot+2018-09-21+at+4.51.06+PM.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gr 5</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsiPNQhEHn-mhyfq45FAD_QO8kbnIVY9w9BB_HJ8d848uuQOeg8Kzj10yOIZUX8zGy-uInt1EOZxEkG4bLUYludfrmiyMlqHEZtr_rBcNNz-VmNUoBFGBoNjunSVOsADrrk8GBA9vt70E/s1600/thin+and+thick+Qs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsiPNQhEHn-mhyfq45FAD_QO8kbnIVY9w9BB_HJ8d848uuQOeg8Kzj10yOIZUX8zGy-uInt1EOZxEkG4bLUYludfrmiyMlqHEZtr_rBcNNz-VmNUoBFGBoNjunSVOsADrrk8GBA9vt70E/s400/thin+and+thick+Qs.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gr 2</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<b>Step 3</b><br />
Select a variety of questions and post them around the room. Allow students freedom of choice to solve whichever problems they want, using whatever strategies they want.<br />
Some examples:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiROHLtKieVqIauZsGQiV_3bFUDBWFECjD0e9V_9ptNENupfO9T4K7_kJtVidoXFhb7clOfswFDVol6Dt3cDFfO0pWu83dXXBRbd9ld3gfzXP6nkYp2Ky1HMaToxILonNCAnxgqE78_Kjo/s1600/Screen+Shot+2018-09-21+at+4.58.33+PM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="742" data-original-width="1272" height="371" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiROHLtKieVqIauZsGQiV_3bFUDBWFECjD0e9V_9ptNENupfO9T4K7_kJtVidoXFhb7clOfswFDVol6Dt3cDFfO0pWu83dXXBRbd9ld3gfzXP6nkYp2Ky1HMaToxILonNCAnxgqE78_Kjo/s640/Screen+Shot+2018-09-21+at+4.58.33+PM.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3TddZcMZvtqye8B3xltH1_It4hmmF3UOED1u12SCWDNCaOZ7P6DjbthJXkxSqLEnNb07xQa8W2TsPQ9QdA-M6QXeWdUPTTDVy1D9dcKM5N2RLyxsLgwRIW2HoZXpMRvXr5DhUTbG5MAM/s1600/bar+graph.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="630" data-original-width="1600" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3TddZcMZvtqye8B3xltH1_It4hmmF3UOED1u12SCWDNCaOZ7P6DjbthJXkxSqLEnNb07xQa8W2TsPQ9QdA-M6QXeWdUPTTDVy1D9dcKM5N2RLyxsLgwRIW2HoZXpMRvXr5DhUTbG5MAM/s640/bar+graph.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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I like this model because it avoids the stigmatization of students being put in high, middle, and low groups and it allows for students to self-differentiate, both in terms of the questions they write and the questions they elect to solve. Engagement is increased because, rather than being told which questions to answer, students have been given the opportunity to pose their own questions and decide which they'd like to tackle. It's the definition of a low floor/high ceiling task, and it provides opportunities for small group interactions within a whole group community setting. The teacher can elect to work with whatever students she feels need guidance without the students feeling that they've been singled out in an ability-based group. Most important, it's fun.<br />
If you'd like to know more about how this has played out in classroom settings, see posts <a href="https://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/01/lets-go-to-movies.html">here</a>, <a href="https://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/09/off-and-running.html">here</a>, and <a href="https://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/01/what-would-happen-if-we-took-problem.html">here</a>. Comments are open for your ideas, observations, and reflections.<br />
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<b> </b>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-42600815242338841702018-09-05T09:30:00.001-07:002018-09-05T09:31:34.356-07:00For Those Going Back It's back-to-school week in New Jersey. But not for me. Over a million students and over a hundred thousand teachers. Crossing guards and lunch ladies. Principals and paras. Bus drivers and van drivers. Security officers and social workers. LDTCs and VPs. But not me.<br />
This is my second back-to-school as a retired public educator. At my wife's urging, I put in one year past my pension eligible 30 years of service and 55 years of age. One final year spent soaking it all up in the only school in the only district I ever worked in: the last teacher orientation, the last room set-up, the last first day, the last back-to school night, the last picture day, the last Halloween parade, the last holiday party, the last assembly, the last parent-teacher conference, the last field day, the last last day. One year of closure. I haven't been back. <br />
I'm still in schools, but it's not the same. More a hired gun. If I miss anything it's the sense of family you build with your colleagues, with your students, with the wider school community. That's what 31 years in the same school will do. So I miss that. That, and all the noise. The commotion and the hubbub you get from 400-plus kids and 80-plus full and part-time staff together in a brick building not too far from Exit 9 off the New Jersey Turnpike.<br />
I want you to know I'm thinking about you all.<br />
So for everyone going back, in this season of going back, I wish you a school year filled with curiosity, wonder, and human connection. Stay safe. <br />
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<i>Across the open mouth of the tent Nick fixed cheesecloth to keep out mosquitoes. He crawled inside under the mosquito bar with various things from the pack to put at the head of the bed under the slant of the canvas. Inside the tent the light came through the brown canvas. It smelled pleasantly of canvas. Already there was something mysterious and homelike. Nick was happy as he crawled inside the tent. He had not been unhappy all day. This was different though. Now things were done. There had been this to do. Now it was done. It had been a hard trip. He was very tired. That was done. He had made his camp. He was settled. Nothing could touch him. It was a good place to camp. He was there, in the good place. He was in his home where he had made it. Now he was hungry.</i><br />
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<div style="text-align: right;">
Ernest Hemingway</div>
<div style="text-align: right;">
Big Two-Hearted River: Part I</div>
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<i> </i>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-88293350163224063002018-08-06T15:54:00.000-07:002018-08-07T04:14:54.373-07:00TMC '18: A Photo Retrospective<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj29EF4uXoIOdQ_gcjfv4HyVza4MBeym_uwSFgUrI-Wjw3ixl9xVRXyTu8xQBAz2k1dRFHej6FoJHgxf28aGBy26f4eqJmM5rt_iYO-efOX0IFUqJ16Z1vpjd9GnpKvudMqU4hyphenhyphendbZJuOM/s1600/welcome+to+Cleveland.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj29EF4uXoIOdQ_gcjfv4HyVza4MBeym_uwSFgUrI-Wjw3ixl9xVRXyTu8xQBAz2k1dRFHej6FoJHgxf28aGBy26f4eqJmM5rt_iYO-efOX0IFUqJ16Z1vpjd9GnpKvudMqU4hyphenhyphendbZJuOM/s400/welcome+to+Cleveland.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I-71 North. Hello Cleveland!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizPzU852etGZf63lmIUfUz7zdljJ7OV4CpjLu6EmtY8PbUcxSimq_ZFWGiAOY_38nN2ztD8Yn3XvRUTWXU4z4JPYb77bSiSPIdCYoCe7RiBwnbdMpEmdkyl6cMXxtp9EzpCcLmWQ5OHsU/s1600/Jamie+by+sign.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizPzU852etGZf63lmIUfUz7zdljJ7OV4CpjLu6EmtY8PbUcxSimq_ZFWGiAOY_38nN2ztD8Yn3XvRUTWXU4z4JPYb77bSiSPIdCYoCe7RiBwnbdMpEmdkyl6cMXxtp9EzpCcLmWQ5OHsU/s400/Jamie+by+sign.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">First-timer <a href="https://twitter.com/MsSpinato">Jamie Spinato</a>. I met Jamie when she student taught at my school. She got a job in the district, participated in one of my summer workshops, and signed on to twitter. I convinced her to try TMC, and we co-presented a session on Friday.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHltC0_wsbdI7R8GrW7w-gmYIrGAe6QDEmo5j6JElmI3TR9QT1_FGd0CKXtcWGLWtC0B30FdGERkGgN894YxPA0E_gYgDmmAcWIh0OYfK1uWQ7F2fMDzQ9MeBPD98InizzfIVux5CX12U/s1600/opening+ceremonies.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHltC0_wsbdI7R8GrW7w-gmYIrGAe6QDEmo5j6JElmI3TR9QT1_FGd0CKXtcWGLWtC0B30FdGERkGgN894YxPA0E_gYgDmmAcWIh0OYfK1uWQ7F2fMDzQ9MeBPD98InizzfIVux5CX12U/s400/opening+ceremonies.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Opening Ceremonies. <a href="https://twitter.com/lmhenry9">Lisa </a>reminds us all to be on time. </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu10gfsfS9ZpjeS7WPxJLSwkWbSW4ahRTaoFQYuCuSJZWpR8oUkjviq2bEYDdBo9GCYJUwBOiCpHCj9-kWBzfkDAhxJSBfeL3ZhM5WhB4WkH7-HFxaQcxpcnEfszLyXiZjyOOKqpgYpPM/s1600/chase.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1258" data-original-width="1600" height="313" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhu10gfsfS9ZpjeS7WPxJLSwkWbSW4ahRTaoFQYuCuSJZWpR8oUkjviq2bEYDdBo9GCYJUwBOiCpHCj9-kWBzfkDAhxJSBfeL3ZhM5WhB4WkH7-HFxaQcxpcnEfszLyXiZjyOOKqpgYpPM/s400/chase.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/mathgeek76">Chase Orton</a> led my morning session on Japanese lesson study. Nobody pulls off a cap like Chase.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/TheMillerMath">Brian Miller </a>led a session on how to use geometry to draw a human eye.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mine didn't come out so good. </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-2NC7RRUUkOQAyAVveMy_ZYaNc0Li7iLxnUh5yC9gw0rWUGbRtrDlHhcAwTOU6fP7ivmAP4CQSFmEorkYgRFjGPfOR7Fju8VTFbLCio7rjIB58eZAgI9z0w9Wf1c-maF0RVKm4rEbxb0/s1600/Brian+Graham+Sheri.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-2NC7RRUUkOQAyAVveMy_ZYaNc0Li7iLxnUh5yC9gw0rWUGbRtrDlHhcAwTOU6fP7ivmAP4CQSFmEorkYgRFjGPfOR7Fju8VTFbLCio7rjIB58eZAgI9z0w9Wf1c-maF0RVKm4rEbxb0/s400/Brian+Graham+Sheri.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Brian Miller,<a href="https://twitter.com/gfletchy"> Graham Fletcher</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/SheriWalker72">Sheri Walker</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoUWJ10s1NGYDXbiwwUhUSeFi4ZtzwPM_BEvmblYJGcE92o3GdlPNm7ECSABLztNDATxmzZEj0eWet4tWTdEole1E3w2Xtosc2b0T2UWQ2DgzN0hVxs599v9F6cGrxc6lrkJ71BQIjffY/s1600/Nicole+Wendy+Annie+Hedge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoUWJ10s1NGYDXbiwwUhUSeFi4ZtzwPM_BEvmblYJGcE92o3GdlPNm7ECSABLztNDATxmzZEj0eWet4tWTdEole1E3w2Xtosc2b0T2UWQ2DgzN0hVxs599v9F6cGrxc6lrkJ71BQIjffY/s400/Nicole+Wendy+Annie+Hedge.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/solvingforx">Nicole Paris</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/wmukluk">Wendy Menard</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/anniek_p">Annie Perkins</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/approx_normal">Hedge</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefMc2QQLpl5BL_YTy7sQn8LFu3pBhZDI3c8ESrFo8dKEs9dfWRuFLc_-G6yzMGkeCnPUfP0Y35u391N3WXUZvVdHHPwoAVvMR1v7eb6ul5_gamTjYmBpjDKdc1ZqoY2W-ABgrYMyy-_E/s1600/Jamie+Edmund+Wendy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefMc2QQLpl5BL_YTy7sQn8LFu3pBhZDI3c8ESrFo8dKEs9dfWRuFLc_-G6yzMGkeCnPUfP0Y35u391N3WXUZvVdHHPwoAVvMR1v7eb6ul5_gamTjYmBpjDKdc1ZqoY2W-ABgrYMyy-_E/s400/Jamie+Edmund+Wendy.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wendy Menard, Jamie, and <a href="https://twitter.com/Gelada">Edmund Harriss</a> grab lunch.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigL-Q8u9_3lrW-oCSHLyV0Xp3ZKiBtrf2iFZC5WQu41y5Cx48MD-XUrHbRqItIs8sXNwkTFqIJIwdhMN5zvYZfq68lfSFiprN3aB4YDl_BNM7xC09Nq94nDFxWln1upHS8t8AJne5-9Y0/s1600/Jason.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigL-Q8u9_3lrW-oCSHLyV0Xp3ZKiBtrf2iFZC5WQu41y5Cx48MD-XUrHbRqItIs8sXNwkTFqIJIwdhMN5zvYZfq68lfSFiprN3aB4YDl_BNM7xC09Nq94nDFxWln1upHS8t8AJne5-9Y0/s400/Jason.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/jasonfhenry">Jason Henry</a>. We need Lisa, and Lisa needs Jason. Ergo we need Jason.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF7FDiNSjyloj4Y5nJXNGrVUh3tnxejyysdXNZcDjnuD7OWCs_hcjCb80lne8ke0kqQpEp7EWZiKz-PzaT4BRUXWXuaJwXEm7d0kNt2Im-XU0hjmeWSsTtHHviJQQC00H5QUtEAz7y0Jk/s1600/Max.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjF7FDiNSjyloj4Y5nJXNGrVUh3tnxejyysdXNZcDjnuD7OWCs_hcjCb80lne8ke0kqQpEp7EWZiKz-PzaT4BRUXWXuaJwXEm7d0kNt2Im-XU0hjmeWSsTtHHviJQQC00H5QUtEAz7y0Jk/s400/Max.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not exactly sure what<a href="https://twitter.com/maxrayriek"> Max</a> has in mind here, but it looks like Barbie Bungee without the bungee.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifiHpeTLB0b7nQyr654I5L9VcSSk2s7sJPexK5HtdzhTg3BjHplhQbBRhxev5QBx8L7KGSnZx7NXVYYBWq0VTdBz11R2CyS4O37kfaXyvKPmFmM3lEG_6bU_qzjFIPndp0S7KYNdQGz30/s1600/HotSpot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifiHpeTLB0b7nQyr654I5L9VcSSk2s7sJPexK5HtdzhTg3BjHplhQbBRhxev5QBx8L7KGSnZx7NXVYYBWq0VTdBz11R2CyS4O37kfaXyvKPmFmM3lEG_6bU_qzjFIPndp0S7KYNdQGz30/s400/HotSpot.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A few blocks from the hotel. This was a good place for breakfast. They had fresh squeezed orange juice.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQC4P3-CZyYtdWB3yJ4d_9TiOODvahff1CUMflfdAwSQ-ZYe-AmWC8S1JyX5323OVqwozl09o1bT0gugUSpJeu1ix0VR5YEVdTFBslvRqXdSCzJel5Of3kzQNXkIzAg8M9JQVAi7Z3xXs/s1600/OJ+machine.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQC4P3-CZyYtdWB3yJ4d_9TiOODvahff1CUMflfdAwSQ-ZYe-AmWC8S1JyX5323OVqwozl09o1bT0gugUSpJeu1ix0VR5YEVdTFBslvRqXdSCzJel5Of3kzQNXkIzAg8M9JQVAi7Z3xXs/s400/OJ+machine.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What do you notice? What are you wondering?</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOsU0oJn0icyhlmww1uOYbjEV5-NXLgFjfGJmBjrQhOrxgs7d6Q48OnHQyQyfBinRWQ2ksAHaxp6Tsyh56JKrts4YIU2FRhgxSkO67WYxaH_AOmCb8kKH-WFI2MTvoSvVLcDJv1rpwecg/s1600/Greta+and+Jamie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOsU0oJn0icyhlmww1uOYbjEV5-NXLgFjfGJmBjrQhOrxgs7d6Q48OnHQyQyfBinRWQ2ksAHaxp6Tsyh56JKrts4YIU2FRhgxSkO67WYxaH_AOmCb8kKH-WFI2MTvoSvVLcDJv1rpwecg/s400/Greta+and+Jamie.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/g_brgmn">Greta </a>and Jamie outside Phoenix Coffee. This was a few blocks from the school, and another good place to get breakfast.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidntJaEb24p0VM715HgyrdOGWh2464jWkJG1wqbQiKFRyTlNX8vnXfweri1rcYZdF-vP5B5HnTOS9irpr98x9qK75-TC1RylHKRogBcipto3vWqwUEK5sRflKYWUZiDWpMFZwsfFZWMYQ/s1600/John+and+Elizabeth.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidntJaEb24p0VM715HgyrdOGWh2464jWkJG1wqbQiKFRyTlNX8vnXfweri1rcYZdF-vP5B5HnTOS9irpr98x9qK75-TC1RylHKRogBcipto3vWqwUEK5sRflKYWUZiDWpMFZwsfFZWMYQ/s400/John+and+Elizabeth.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/mathhombre">John Golden</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/cheesemonkeysf">Elizabeth Statmore</a> share a moment.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheSVt3hj6qKpp9Q5k6BrKuusscL9PlwCoujpzel4l6XySUKcG_UxHbn50EVx_bHDMb30MTYuPH2PkimU5Rpty9R059hqu8-WbFVgi8fHIQ-BLCfWj3q4pWGcO60Ic6cXi2e0sirhfi0gc/s1600/Kent.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheSVt3hj6qKpp9Q5k6BrKuusscL9PlwCoujpzel4l6XySUKcG_UxHbn50EVx_bHDMb30MTYuPH2PkimU5Rpty9R059hqu8-WbFVgi8fHIQ-BLCfWj3q4pWGcO60Ic6cXi2e0sirhfi0gc/s400/Kent.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/KentHaines">Kent Haines</a> did a session on Exploding Dots. I kinda get it now. </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh58XAtSE-aFAsJMQPXXG0EQPsd5kFP5m36UF2gSAGZD23nv7bNX5LYsUBicIBakBDIUJzXxXTZQk60pAcqTNdTe67Jc3m8b0EaVKp8Q-8eFDB7VCEkahAvSNIR0PJ1oN31CrUnqMiWQmQ/s1600/Bob+Lochel.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1470" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh58XAtSE-aFAsJMQPXXG0EQPsd5kFP5m36UF2gSAGZD23nv7bNX5LYsUBicIBakBDIUJzXxXTZQk60pAcqTNdTe67Jc3m8b0EaVKp8Q-8eFDB7VCEkahAvSNIR0PJ1oN31CrUnqMiWQmQ/s400/Bob+Lochel.jpg" width="366" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/bobloch">Bob Lochel</a> did a session on how to make yucky math topics more fun. I wish Bob had been one of my high school math teachers.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcyESXtg4Shek3tDJ4-zK0RHdJQg21Pqpafu7dhWO2KlUCzjIfTFXHMrwgHRwXpnxfEcEVsRCrYjr5ZaxUEIpZ76rgUhQpBGFEsKxNsn7qXSIFxscixEdUftM8bQlo_EEr8B1Ne6GAgSY/s1600/bob+math.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcyESXtg4Shek3tDJ4-zK0RHdJQg21Pqpafu7dhWO2KlUCzjIfTFXHMrwgHRwXpnxfEcEVsRCrYjr5ZaxUEIpZ76rgUhQpBGFEsKxNsn7qXSIFxscixEdUftM8bQlo_EEr8B1Ne6GAgSY/s400/bob+math.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I mathed. Thanks Bob!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhML0bw6O8aIJgZCPLaYWzVME-guknwnPZvAqmi4a6Psq_QEiDxPppqYxixzfFGHBZJDiAIYiYyTV6HX8y5WkpfmLjlPlGIlYJ1CvB4ds8E_P4f5cOhQvw2xVoKQ-sQzAfSRBEoa-SF4Fo/s1600/Lisa+Nicole+Amie+Chrissy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhML0bw6O8aIJgZCPLaYWzVME-guknwnPZvAqmi4a6Psq_QEiDxPppqYxixzfFGHBZJDiAIYiYyTV6HX8y5WkpfmLjlPlGIlYJ1CvB4ds8E_P4f5cOhQvw2xVoKQ-sQzAfSRBEoa-SF4Fo/s400/Lisa+Nicole+Amie+Chrissy.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dinner with <a href="https://twitter.com/lisa_bej">Lisa Bejarano</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/nomad_penguin">Amie Albrecht</a>, Nicole Paris, and<a href="https://twitter.com/MrsNewell22"> Chrissy Newell</a>. Amie came all the way from Australia!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3FIClQtGK0plcTQkDFB6PcoOy-doOeCd1ZcFZhS8gNCkKZbitXJAlJApFDOQBxdb-7GiZi13PMda7FntIUnOOK76VPqAUB6961BHdts5NR3sibel6V4BjRCzvkr6P3lnashnw3skrq1c/s1600/Mitchell%2527s.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3FIClQtGK0plcTQkDFB6PcoOy-doOeCd1ZcFZhS8gNCkKZbitXJAlJApFDOQBxdb-7GiZi13PMda7FntIUnOOK76VPqAUB6961BHdts5NR3sibel6V4BjRCzvkr6P3lnashnw3skrq1c/s400/Mitchell%2527s.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pretty much everybody wound up at <a href="https://mitchellshomemade.com/">Mitchell's </a>at some point. Their ice-cream was really good, and I'm an ice-cream snob. </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVzLptSy0hM5DxmrbC487p_3pFBsGNS09in7CvMHfVMiWGDZkUnD3u-chfMkAy23ZXbO7xQl6QhxYInb1X5oIpqvVGS6VpmII8nEMucjpGxkBLB-FYj1LOPeLK1YEvVV9HORUslhO_0cY/s1600/Dylan+and+Lisa.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVzLptSy0hM5DxmrbC487p_3pFBsGNS09in7CvMHfVMiWGDZkUnD3u-chfMkAy23ZXbO7xQl6QhxYInb1X5oIpqvVGS6VpmII8nEMucjpGxkBLB-FYj1LOPeLK1YEvVV9HORUslhO_0cY/s400/Dylan+and+Lisa.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/dylanpkane">Dylan Kane</a> made a last minute appearance. He did a session with Lisa Bejarano. </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP8_wWiP-_U9qrvbims3Pb3HaMasjx2h5UUIz7hP5dRIBRl2hRxHBQIc0Jb645J6T3rz_V4rxWzjNAhhIaet4FCh1s5CKqmlbZaL1sNJi6sEffZOa_iovrC8EQxbVL1wmki0c6luWSCR8/s1600/Islamic+art.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP8_wWiP-_U9qrvbims3Pb3HaMasjx2h5UUIz7hP5dRIBRl2hRxHBQIc0Jb645J6T3rz_V4rxWzjNAhhIaet4FCh1s5CKqmlbZaL1sNJi6sEffZOa_iovrC8EQxbVL1wmki0c6luWSCR8/s400/Islamic+art.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/Veganmathbeagle">Megan Schmidt</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/sweimar">Steve Weimar</a>, and Annie Perkins were kind enough to run a flex session on Islamic Geometric Design. Not bad for my first try!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyOEC10vnfxy8F2ux9Ps3iJZggFaTkUY31CZuB8d2HD78QK0fBeXFpBD0hxZrBQ9HPtqFLIUzITToQuTsHrKsT6u-m1B90PkOYbRoJtWJsVpnZUTspvaugkkVUQ-inEOI8e1Y0Aaja_8E/s1600/Ben.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyOEC10vnfxy8F2ux9Ps3iJZggFaTkUY31CZuB8d2HD78QK0fBeXFpBD0hxZrBQ9HPtqFLIUzITToQuTsHrKsT6u-m1B90PkOYbRoJtWJsVpnZUTspvaugkkVUQ-inEOI8e1Y0Aaja_8E/s400/Ben.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/benjaminsabree">Ben Sabree</a> was so into it he continued to work on his design on the bus back to the hotel.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-Tr8mnvY-XBpbiW-OPjzREjG4gt_Af_W6tYF-z1l9gCPWa60bu9bbNvFYS2YO8T6Nio2_Pv8n-dGrVVrgBVYB_zC6vQNwY0mkAuY7hdg-jYyEPb3rw6UmaE4mdcTBB31f_Pscu-gArPo/s1600/Megan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-Tr8mnvY-XBpbiW-OPjzREjG4gt_Af_W6tYF-z1l9gCPWa60bu9bbNvFYS2YO8T6Nio2_Pv8n-dGrVVrgBVYB_zC6vQNwY0mkAuY7hdg-jYyEPb3rw6UmaE4mdcTBB31f_Pscu-gArPo/s400/Megan.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Megan did a My Favorite and reminded everyone about the importance of elementary school teachers. Thanks Megan!</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis77YQsjbdBHBBvjk7wANTXYCqyJgvnT00DPoyhvlK8_tu-v8uCFDimWR1A_1r7oxvAwTBUGSYWZDe90OmXgjY9s0TlNZxx4j5KNDcEHzypkmaaQ-yfs4PLq4a_0F6mURWDI9Wu1-wCHQ/s1600/Edmund+Glenn+and+John.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEis77YQsjbdBHBBvjk7wANTXYCqyJgvnT00DPoyhvlK8_tu-v8uCFDimWR1A_1r7oxvAwTBUGSYWZDe90OmXgjY9s0TlNZxx4j5KNDcEHzypkmaaQ-yfs4PLq4a_0F6mURWDI9Wu1-wCHQ/s400/Edmund+Glenn+and+John.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Edmund, <a href="https://twitter.com/gwaddellnvhs">Glen Waddell</a>, and John at the Phoenix preparing for their keynote.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj12HtBiBzS68GJNLTgIJyvgByLEsvUfN6tGqf4Ymb9t8xgTr_KJZVUDN9dKAZ41HYtMlQn1rB0JglZ_JGfmCuLn1r1gYv1fzlp6EBgScJdTPsTKwCTvVvaWRDXJt7rgLH5sgxihHVZ2MA/s1600/Jamie+Sasha+Anna.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1187" data-original-width="1600" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj12HtBiBzS68GJNLTgIJyvgByLEsvUfN6tGqf4Ymb9t8xgTr_KJZVUDN9dKAZ41HYtMlQn1rB0JglZ_JGfmCuLn1r1gYv1fzlp6EBgScJdTPsTKwCTvVvaWRDXJt7rgLH5sgxihHVZ2MA/s400/Jamie+Sasha+Anna.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jersey girls Jamie Spinato, <a href="https://twitter.com/harpgirl555">Anna Panova</a>, and<a href="https://twitter.com/aofradkin"> Sasha Fradkin</a>. They don't pump gas.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDhWSVwfz56Lf-Oem54J6E_JLHroXRqpirHRATgYY_SPwO4icPvetcIxWywsW_pQReGJNAcmLNoc90XM3km50zTDO-KE61jG_4y_13-slMaQzUsAEs2r5HPuMM07dW9r6s3q8HFLwVILE/s1600/Set.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDhWSVwfz56Lf-Oem54J6E_JLHroXRqpirHRATgYY_SPwO4icPvetcIxWywsW_pQReGJNAcmLNoc90XM3km50zTDO-KE61jG_4y_13-slMaQzUsAEs2r5HPuMM07dW9r6s3q8HFLwVILE/s400/Set.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Game night is one of my favorite parts of TMC. This year, the game of Set was a big hit. That's <a href="https://twitter.com/cluzniak">Chris Luzniak</a>, Chrissy Newell, and <a href="https://twitter.com/park_star">Michelle N.</a> </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwdc90zrgosfjIJ3TTSlEN-XP6E2Rq5zGP4_Ti0tUHN4-KrQmuACj8xKnyxEihqoaccoO3Z0NGSWZ6n1-AtTrGEPCd3UU_4B8XmXqwQZ0t0oIbfg2eB725wv48nVteOWmF-Ji_DkQrdN0/s1600/Tina+and+friend.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1130" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwdc90zrgosfjIJ3TTSlEN-XP6E2Rq5zGP4_Ti0tUHN4-KrQmuACj8xKnyxEihqoaccoO3Z0NGSWZ6n1-AtTrGEPCd3UU_4B8XmXqwQZ0t0oIbfg2eB725wv48nVteOWmF-Ji_DkQrdN0/s400/Tina+and+friend.jpg" width="282" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/crstn85">Tina Cardone</a> shows off one of her creations.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefdDmPM5MISQMLPYYsK9IEnixLCBDSmYmjzlWrfJJEeBbB7uqp-5LdOtbvLOjRChDxJOGrfpsHk4vfioUV-2asIxFkLK9I1YIJvl99JplggyBKA4EIYV-jhAChsSwgqo-_0bG6LctyJ4/s1600/Glenn+and+John+and+%253F.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhefdDmPM5MISQMLPYYsK9IEnixLCBDSmYmjzlWrfJJEeBbB7uqp-5LdOtbvLOjRChDxJOGrfpsHk4vfioUV-2asIxFkLK9I1YIJvl99JplggyBKA4EIYV-jhAChsSwgqo-_0bG6LctyJ4/s400/Glenn+and+John+and+%253F.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/jomalleyiv">John O'Malley IV</a>, Glenn Waddell, and a friend exploring tiles.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9uId47b1Rp5ARlFUOvGy8wpqMnLE1waF7jo2swsj_xhZ6t5PW5d9Dtln90sVaDttPNYYxU888Mp3jZivqOYuIahftrocspikLzjHYKISodWCrnaOegF1FhCYmj26b-_qGW7Ie1rxkx2I/s1600/magic.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9uId47b1Rp5ARlFUOvGy8wpqMnLE1waF7jo2swsj_xhZ6t5PW5d9Dtln90sVaDttPNYYxU888Mp3jZivqOYuIahftrocspikLzjHYKISodWCrnaOegF1FhCYmj26b-_qGW7Ie1rxkx2I/s400/magic.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">John Golden finally taught me how to play Magic. He let me win.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Goodnight TMC '18. (Photo credit: Tina Cardone)</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Where will we be in 2019? The suspense is killing us!! </td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Who's in?</td></tr>
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<br />Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-48673171856918655612018-07-31T15:27:00.000-07:002018-07-31T15:31:54.072-07:00Now You Know One spring many years ago my principal needed to take some personal time during the week of the grade 5 state standardized test. As lead teacher (there was no vice-principal), I was nominally in charge, but given the grave importance of the week's events an administrator from central office was sent to help me cover the building. Not minutes into first day of testing we got a call from the BD room. One of the students, set off by the stress of the situation, was having a violent, emotional breakdown. His teacher had removed him from the room and was restraining him in the hallway. The rest of the students were waiting to continue. Who would take over the test administration?<br />
After assessing the situation in the hall, the covering administrator stepped into the breach. She stayed with the class for the rest of the morning, overseeing the completion of the day's test sections. At lunch I stopped by the office to see how she had made out. I found her sitting at the principal's desk, head in hands, visibly shaken. It looked as if she had been weeping. She didn't have to say anything. I knew what the matter was.<br />
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<a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2018/07/commencement-address.html"> My feelings about high-stakes standardized testing have never been a secret.</a> Administering them to students was part of my job description, and doing it made me feel morally compromised. Not having the courage to stand up for my principles, actually becoming a part of a system that was being used discredit myself and my colleagues by weaponizing data in an attempt to delegitimize public education while at the same time causing emotional trauma to children, made me feel powerless, guilty and complicit. <a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/why-the-united-states-is-destroying-its-education-system/">(That's how systems like this are designed.)</a> Refusing to allow my own children to be used by opting them out helped, but only a little.<br />
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One year I was assigned to administer the NJASK to one of our classified students. He was a fourth grader at the time. His IEP stipulated he was to receive the test in a separate room, one-to-one, with all text and questions read aloud and all written responses scribed. I was chosen to be his test administrator. The LDTC was asked to vacate her room from 9:00 to 11:30, and it was there we set up shop. There were actually three of us in the room; myself, the student, and his imaginary friend who stayed under his desk and whom he would occasionally consult. This went on for an entire week. Although he answered only a handful of questions correctly (some by lucky guess), he was pretty smart. He knew he didn't know the answers, but he pretended to try and figure things out. As much as I encouraged him, and told him that he was putting forth a wonderful effort, I could tell that he knew that I knew that he didn't know much of what was on the test. I silently prayed he didn't feel he was embarrassing himself in front of me by his performance. We both did a good job pretending that what was really happening wasn't really happening. The only way I can describe the experience is to say it was truly surreal.<br />
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Once when I was teaching third grade a kid threw up on his answer booklet. I had to stop the test administration and call the principal. The student went to the nurse. I continued testing and the principal filed an irregularity report. We had to put the vomited-on test booklet in a plastic baggie and send it back to the state. I'm not sure what they did with it. The student had to take a make-up.</div>
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When New Jersey implemented its regimen of testing every single child every single year from grades 3 through 12, the test developed for use was called the NJASK (New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge). The summer before the test went "live" I sat for a week in a conference room at a hotel in Monroe with a bunch of other elementary school teachers from the state. Our job was to read through stacks of booklets containing student responses from the pilot version and, using that as a guide, set cut scores for proficiency. I was proud to have been selected for the task. It was an important job, and we took it very seriously. Towards the end of the week we provided our cut score numbers to the Department of Education and ETS overlords who had been monitoring our work. They told us to go back to the drawing board. Why? Because given our numbers, "Too many students would pass." It was then I realized that the entire exercise had been a farce. They could have just set the cut scores themselves. They were using us as cover. I protested, and refused to participate in re-setting the cut scores. After the work was finished, they asked for three volunteers to go before the state Board of Education and present the findings. I volunteered along with two others. Guess who didn't get picked to go.</div>
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Remember that equation? Here's what it means:<br />
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The project of using standardized test scores to evaluate teachers<a href="http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2018/07/sgps-still-biased-still-inappropriate.html"> has been discredited.</a> We've known this <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/leading-mathematician-debunks-value-added/2011/05/08/AFb999UG_blog.html?utm_term=.0db9385d37bc">for a long time. </a> The sordid underside of testing industry's scoring practices <a href="https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/making-the-grades-todd-s-farley/1102622667">has been exposed.</a> We've known that for a long time too. For a teacher, the results come back too late to be actionable. And even if they didn't, they still wouldn't help, because if something was wrong I'd have little idea <i>why. </i>If there is value in using them to evaluate larger populations, then sampling would do the job just fine. It just isn't necessary to test every single child. To paraphrase <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Krashen">Stephen Krashen</a>, when you go to a doctor for a blood test, he doesn't take <i>all </i>your blood. To understand why it continues, follow the money. Billions of dollars have gone to line the pockets of test developers, curriculum and test-prep writers, publishers, and providers, computer software developers and tech companies tasked with bringing school wireless capacities and other technologies up to standardized testing requirements (and of course providing continuing tech support). This is all in addition to those school operators who profit from the corporatization of education when public schools are shut down. Thought experiment: If you had billions of dollars to spend on education, how would you spend it?</div>
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When I found the central office administrator behind the principal's desk that long ago spring, I wanted to ask, "What did you <i>think </i>went on? How exactly did you think all that data got harvested?" But I didn't. She had witnessed something sad, disturbing, and frightening, and I felt bad for her. I guess it was her first time. All I offered was, "Well, now you know." </div>
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-27258285827584631762018-07-17T06:51:00.000-07:002018-07-17T06:51:45.538-07:00Commencement Address My daughter graduated from high school last month. <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/08/dont-worry-so-much.html">(I told you not to worry so much.)</a> Several days before the end of the final term, she brought home her cumulative folder. It contained absence records, consent and registration forms, proof of residency, various permission slips, and, of course, report cards and standardized test scores.<br />
I could brag about many of her school accomplishments. And I don't mean to show off, but here's one I'm especially proud of:<br />
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Determined not to have our children used by the testing-industrial complex, and inspired by a visit to Washington, DC, where as a family we attended an <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/occupy-doe-push-democratic-not-corporate-education-reform/">Occupy the DOE protest and a march to the White House</a>, we made the decision in 2013 to opt-out of our state standardized testing. We faced pressure from the school, the district, and the state, but our minds were made up. The superintendent refused our request to have our daughter moved to another room to read, study, or do schoolwork. She sat at a desk in a classroom hour after hour, day after day, as the rest of her classmates filled in bubbles and wrote constructed responses in their test booklets. (That first year we learned an invaluable lesson; even if you have no intention of taking the test, you need to actually crack the seal on the booklet. Day one she had left the book unopened, and we were informed that when the week of testing was over the district would insist she sit for that day's make-up, missing actual instructional class time. As if we needed any more proof that the system was completely out of control. Of course now things are different and I'm not sure what the computerized equivalent of cracking the seal might be.) <br />
She was bored and self-conscious, but children have suffered much, much worse in displays of civil disobedience. The following year she did it again, and my son, two years ahead of her in school, did the same. My hope was that the opt-out movement would grow, ultimately reaching some type of critical mass. I pictured the entire corrosive system as a giant monster with an insatiable appetite for data. Data was its fuel. Data was its sustenance. It needed data to live. Withhold the data and the monster would die. As the years went by the movement did grow, as more students elected to opt out. And the district softened its policies. They provided rooms for the refuseniks to read and study while their classmates were testing. But the critical mass I had hoped for never materialized, and the insanity continues.<br />
In recent weeks <a href="https://www.nj.com/education/2018/07/murphy_parcc_graduation_changes.html">New Jersey has moved to eliminate some of its testing requirements</a>, and I can't help but think we played a small role in making that happen. Yet federal law still requires that all children starting in grade 3 be tested each and every year. States can work around the edges, lessen the number of testing days and change the name of the assessment, but the monster still lives, feeding off the data generated by the sweat, tears, and humiliation of hundreds of thousands of children. They won't be mine.<br />
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<i style="text-align: left;"> </i><i style="text-align: left;">The truly educated become conscious. They become self-aware. They do not lie to themselves. They do not pretend that fraud is moral or that corporate greed is good. They do not claim that the demands of the marketplace can morally justify the hunger of children or denial of medical care to the sick. They do not throw 6 million families from their homes as the cost of doing business. </i><i>Thought is a dialogue with one's inner self. Those who think ask questions, questions those in authority do not want asked. They remember who we are, where we came from and where we should go. They remain eternally skeptical and distrustful of power. And they know that this moral independence is the only protection from the radical evil that results from collective unconscious. The capacity to think is the only bulwark against any centralized authority that seeks to impose mindless obedience. </i><br />
<i> ....We must fear, (Hannah) Arendt warned, those whose moral system is built around the structure of blind obedience. We must fear those who cannot think. Unconscious civilizations become totalitarian wastelands.</i></div>
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Hedges">Chris Hedges</a></div>
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<a href="https://www.truthdig.com/articles/why-the-united-states-is-destroying-its-education-system/">Why the United States is Destroying Its Education System<i> </i></a><br />
April 11, 2011<br />
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The path to graduation wasn't always smooth. Classified the summer between grades 4 and 5, by the time her middle school career was over she would, by sheer force of will, work her way from a self-contained class to a resource room to full declassification. And despite the continued protestations from the state and the district, she would never take the PARCC. The earth continued to spin on its axis and circle the sun. She went to class, did her homework, and took an untold number of school quizzes and tests. She became a bat-mitzvah, danced, got her driver's license, and worked 20 hours a week as a server in a retirement community dining room <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2016/08/talking-math-with-your-kid-end-of.html">(no cash register.)</a> She has attributes that no standardized test can measure, like courage, persistence, and empathy. What could a PARCC score have possibly told me about her that I didn't already know? That her teachers didn't already know? What could taking it possibly do for her except reinforce the notion she was a less than adequate student? Whose interests would be served? Ultimately, who would care? Not any of the six universities that were happy to have her enter with their freshman class.<br />
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<a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2014/08/dont-worry-so-much.html"> I told you not to worry so much.</a></div>
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</style>Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-26446801645953415932018-06-13T19:26:00.000-07:002018-06-13T19:26:54.549-07:00With More Love And Appreciation Than There Are Even Words For<b>1. An Epiphany</b><br />
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<i> </i>This happened one morning, many years ago. I was driving past one of my town's elementary schools, on the way to work in a neighboring district. The local teachers were embroiled in contentious contract negotiations, so I wasn't surprised to see them gathered en masse outside the building on a job action, waving signs and chanting. I honked my horn to show support, and, right at that moment, had an epiphany: "It's all women! It's like suffragettes protesting for the right to vote! This isn't a teacher thing, it's a woman thing!" Then I got to work and forgot about it.<br />
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<b>2. A Creepy Resemblance To An Abusive Husband</b><br />
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<i> For the last ten years, I've been a covert operative in Women's World, a.k.a. Public School. I am not a typical elementary teacher. I am male. </i><br />
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So writes <a href="https://twitter.com/sethnbeth?lang=en">Seth Nichols</a> in a recent post titled: <a href="https://sethnichols.wordpress.com/2018/05/17/why-teachers-are-walking-out/">Why Teachers Are Walking Out.</a> Here's Nichols on the recent uprisings in states like <a href="https://www.vox.com/2018/4/13/17233500/oklahoma-teacher-strike-over">Oklahoma</a>, <a href="https://wtop.com/education/2018/05/arizona-teacher-raises-passed-after-strike-shuts-schools/">Arizona</a>, <a href="http://fortune.com/2018/05/15/north-carolina-teachers-strike/">North Carolina</a>, and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/09/us/teachers-union-movement/index.html">West Virginia</a>:<br />
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<i>Women are <b>done</b> being taken advantage of. That's what this is about. Don't think that it's a coincidence that mass walk-outs are happening within a year of the #metoo movements, the sex abuse revelations, or the women's marches. </i><br />
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<i> </i><a href="https://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2017/08/15/the-nations-teaching-force-is-still-mostly.html">About 77% of the nation's teachers are female. In elementary school it's nearly 90%. </a>I know exactly what Nichols is talking about; I was an operative in Women's World for 31 years. Nichols again:<br />
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<i>The system, in many places, bears a creepy resemblance to an abusive husband. If she loses "him" (her job), she feels like she would lose everything. He constantly tells her she's not good enough, and has spreadsheets with scores to prove it. He blames her for the kids problems, and offers no real help in fixing them. But she stays and puts up with him--because she loves the kids.</i><br />
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<i> </i>The post triggered a memory. The memory of driving to work one morning, past a school similar to my own, and having an epiphany: "It's a woman thing!" But what was that thing? At the time I didn't know. I had honked my horn in solidarity. But it was in solidarity as a fellow teacher, not as a man in solidarity with women.<br />
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<b>3. Standing In The School Parking Lot</b><br />
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I was a proud, dues paying member of the union my entire teaching career, and served many years as a building rep, with all the responsibilities that position entails. Although we never went out on strike, I participated in plenty of job actions: writing letters, wearing buttons and shirts, working "to the contract" by entering and/or leaving the building not a minute before/after the negotiated start/end time, showing up and speaking out at Board of Ed meetings, rallying outside central office during negotiation sessions. During all that time, even standing in the school parking lot, waiting for the clock to strike 8:35, when we all would march into the building together, a male amidst a sea of women, it never occurred to me to connect our labor unrest to gender.<br />
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<b>4. A School Just Like Our School</b><br />
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<b> </b>On December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza shot and killed his mother, then drove to Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Hook_Elementary_School_shooting">shot and killed 20 first graders and six adults</a>. Then he shot himself in the head. Teachers and support staff died protecting their students from the gunman. This hit us especially hard, even harder than all the other ones. Previous school shootings seemed to take place in high schools or on college campuses; this one took place in an elementary school. Connecticut was close to New Jersey, geographically, culturally. Newtown seemed to be like our town. Sandy Hook seemed like a school just like our school.<br />
As it happened, the 2012-2013 school year saw another round of heated contract negotiations between my union local and the Board of Education. One Board of Ed member had two children enrolled at our school. His work schedule allowed him to be home in the afternoons. During the days when I had dismissal duty, I would often see him standing outside, waiting to pick up his kids and walk them home. As the negotiations dragged on, reports of the Board's intransigence filtered back to us. I remember standing outside one afternoon, watching him hug his kids as they ran happily out the front door of the school, and, with Sandy Hook still so raw, thinking angrily: <i>Every single adult in that school would act as a human shield, putting <b>their</b> bodies in front of <b>your</b> children. And you're trying to nickel and dime us on a contract. You should be ashamed of yourself.</i><br />
In subsequent years I had occasion to work with both of his kids, and struck up a cordial relationship with him. He seemed like a very nice guy. But I never forgot the feeling I had that afternoon.<br />
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<b>5. Before Or After Columbine?</b><br />
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<b> </b>When did we start having lockdown drills? Before or after Columbine? I think it was after, but I really don't remember. What's the difference between lockdown doors and lockdown windows again? When we shelter-in-place, we can go about our normal business inside but just can't go outside, right? And what's the all-clear code? I know we've been over it again and again at faculty meetings but could we review it one more time? When did we hire B. and F., the two women who took turns sitting at a desk in the front lobby to check people in? When did we replace them with shifts of retired cops, who we euphemistically called school resource officers? When did they build the outer vestibule onto the front of the school? When did we start carrying walkie-talkies? When did the back entrance get locked? When did we get photo IDs to wear? When did the IDs become swipe cards? When did they install the security cameras in the hallways? When did it start to hit us that our job, besides being really hard, could also actually be dangerous?<br />
On February 14, 2018, Nikolas Cruz killed 14 students and 3 staff members, and wounded 17 others at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoneman_Douglas_High_School_shooting">Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.</a> Two days later my <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/20/nyregion/east-brunswick-nj-armed-officers-schools.html">former district announced it was hiring armed police officers </a>to supplement the 71 retired law enforcement officers already present in the schools. According to someone I know still working in the district, there's now an armed officer in each building during school hours, although during Field Day last week the one assigned to his school was patrolling outside. In a bullet-proof vest.<br />
Since the announcement there have been 10 shootings at high schools and 1 at a middle school, leaving 14 dead and 24 injured. This includes the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/18/us/school-shooting-santa-fe-texas.html">shooting at Santa Fe High School</a> in Santa Fe, Texas. The shooter used a shotgun and a revolver, and authorities found multiple IEDs, Molotov cocktails, propane tanks, pipe bombs, and other explosives around the school and the parking lot.<br />
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<b>6. ...And Be Prepared To Take Bullets For Them, Too</b><br />
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Seth Nichols:<br />
<i> It's not about the pay. It's about all of the ways an entire sector of the country's most selfless givers have been complicit to a system that has evolved to bilk them every way it can: of their time, their money, their energy, and their emotions. </i><br />
<i>Pay for it yourself. </i><br />
<i>Create it yourself. </i><br />
<i>Stay late and put on that function yourself. </i><br />
<i>Meet during your time. </i><br />
<i>Work during your week-end.</i><br />
<i>Be kind to people yelling, ignoring, cussing, and hitting you. Then, make sure they pass the new standards.</i><br />
<i>...And be prepared to take bullets for them, too.</i><br />
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<b>7. It's Also About The Pay</b><br />
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<b> </b><i>Kayla Melton (an Oklahoma kindergarten teacher) said she had brought in her tax returns returns to show her state senator that in the past three years she had spent twenty-six hundred dollars on school supplies. The senator, a Republican named Rob Standridge, "wouldn't even look at the returns," Melton said. </i><br />
<i> </i> <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/06/04/the-teachers-strike-and-the-democratic-revival-in-oklahoma">The Teachers' Strike and the Democratic Revival in Oklahoma, Rivka Galchen</a><br />
<a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/06/04/the-teachers-strike-and-the-democratic-revival-in-oklahoma"> The New Yorker, June 4-11, 2018</a><br />
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Is it a coincidence that the season of teacher unrest has coincided with rise the #metoo movement <b>and </b>the Parkland/Santa Fe massacres? Teachers are tired of being bullied and abused. (<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/chris-christie-to-teachers-union-you-deserve-a-punch-in-the-face/2015/08/03/86358c2c-39de-11e5-8e98-115a3cf7d7ae_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.629a21775bd6">New Jersey teachers know all about that, too.</a>) They're tired of being told it's all their fault. And they're tired of hearing about students getting shot. And they're tired of hearing about teachers getting shot. They want to be heard. And they want to get paid. They should get paid. It's also about the pay.<br />
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<b>8. Even Though I Am Scared Of The World We Live In I Am Comforted</b><br />
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<b> </b>On December 17, 2012, three days after Sandy Hook, a grade 3 teacher at my school received an e-mail from the parents of one of her students. It was addressed to her, the school's student assistance counselor, the principal, and the staff:<br />
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<i>...In light of recent events I felt it is necessary to just say thank you for all you do in a day. I would be a nervous wreck if I did not know that M. was in a school that had such great educators, support staff, and mental health workers. I am there enough to see how you help people, how you know the children who seem to have behavior challenges and social issues. I see how the women in the office seem to know exactly which kids need a little TLC and which kids need to be firmly reminded to go back to their classrooms quietly. I drive into the back parking lot at pick up to see about a dozen support staff, aides, and teachers helping children that need more attention onto busses with care and asking questions that show they know more about the student than their name and serial number. I truly feel blessed to be part of this school.</i><br />
<i> .....You are all doing the very best you can with a lot of students, people who seemingly constantly have an issue, parents that complain there is too much security and then turn around and say it is the school's fault when people are let in and let's face it there is never enough money to educate our children.</i><br />
<i> .....I want to take this horrible time in our country and let you know that our most precious gift is in your school every day and that even though I am scared of the world we live in I am comforted knowing the the people of C____ School would be heroes in a time of crisis and are the everyday heroes in an average day. </i><br />
<i> In closing, we as communities ask so much from our schools. We rely on them to be parent, caregiver, educator, behavior modifier, lunch room monitor, and the list goes on and on. From the art teacher...who remarkably ALWAYS knows exactly what is going on when, to the Phys Ed teachers...who seem to know exactly what to say to a kid when they are being too wild, to the music teachers who are listening to the horrible noise of those recorders all day and still are smiling at the end of the day, to M, in custodial care who always wishes me a good afternoon, and makes sure that the building looks like a place the kids can be proud of...THANK YOU!!!!!!!</i><br />
<i> If anything positive came out of the tragedy in CT. In our house it was reminding our daughter that you are all part of her team. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!</i><br />
<i> With more love and appreciation than there are even words for,</i><br />
<i> </i><i>SDN and BN</i><br />
<i>(And M. too even though she won't know how much you are doing for her till she gets older.)</i><br />
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I saved the e-mail.<br />
Now I know why.<br />
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-90150333619802698532018-05-07T16:48:00.000-07:002018-05-27T10:20:52.505-07:00What I Learned In Kindergarten, Part 1: On Pattern Blocks <b> 8 schools. 24 classrooms. 30 teachers. Over 500 kids. I spent a lot of time this year in kindergarten. Armed with Amy Noelle Parks's <u><a href="https://www.nctm.org/Store/Products/Exploring-Mathematics-through-Play-In-the-Early-Childhood-Classroom/">Exploring Mathematics Through Play in the Early Childhood Classroom </a></u>and Julie Sarama and Douglas Clements's <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Early-Childhood-Mathematics-Education-Research/dp/0805863095"><u>Early Childhood Mathematics Education Research</u>,</a> I watched, listened, and learned from some incredibly talented and thoughtful kindergarten teachers and their incredibly talented and thoughtful students. What should a kindergarten math classroom look like? What kinds of activities should students be engaged in? What's the appropriate balance between free exploration and direct teacher instruction? How are students held accountable for their work and learning? This first in series of posts will attempt to illustrate how we tried to answer those questions.</b><br />
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Here are two students working with large, foam pattern blocks. What are they learning?<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" mozallowfullscreen="" src="https://player.vimeo.com/video/267427221" style="height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; top: 0; width: 100%;" webkitallowfullscreen=""></iframe></div>
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<a href="https://vimeo.com/267427221">pattern blocks free play</a> from <a href="https://vimeo.com/user28403510">Joe Schwartz</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.<br />
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So much about what these kindergarteners were doing fascinated me. The quiet way they worked together. The symmetry. The way they thought about the negative space. The trial and error. The teacher, who you can hear in the background running a guided math group, put no constraints on the activity, and she trusted the the students would work cooperatively and use the pattern blocks in an appropriate way. That doesn't happen by chance; the teacher made sure that her students knew just how to act in this independent center using these specific materials.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUCRea-jTgqbLUuZAbPPT9Gf9HhQjN5xfRb_qYcKDc3U-skWwBXdRx0cZ_KwwakXVmdNQYoE0qq1mQ36EQERJbG78jjSX0mXaicVlHS4M87_RywDrgazmFaXjJqhnaoc36ne-GTpwTpVg/s1600/IMG_9242.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUCRea-jTgqbLUuZAbPPT9Gf9HhQjN5xfRb_qYcKDc3U-skWwBXdRx0cZ_KwwakXVmdNQYoE0qq1mQ36EQERJbG78jjSX0mXaicVlHS4M87_RywDrgazmFaXjJqhnaoc36ne-GTpwTpVg/s400/IMG_9242.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A different classroom. Again, no teacher direction. This took four students close to 20 minutes to create.</td></tr>
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Play settings like this, Parks writes,<br />
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<i> Often provide children with far more genuine opportunities to engage in mathematical practices than in formal lessons. Because in lessons, teachers have clear goals about what they want students to do and understand, and they are able to nudge students in subtle and obvious ways to complete the task. ("Ivan why don't you see if you can make the smaller rectangle fit?") In providing these hints, teachers often take over a good deal of the mathematical reasoning, while also cutting down on children's opportunities to persevere on their own. pgs. 9-10</i><br />
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As I read, watched, listened, and learned, I began to encourage teachers to explore the many different ways their students could interact with pattern blocks in independent, non-teacher directed centers:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2kXtUHJvVmk1EWCKLM4QYyhwAlwaNV42gchnkhrLWBfvA3QkIA7WKsWL3HliULY0VLZku6QqTuLCE6utE7BL7Ty5FDOozB_DNe9zzHDOWygaJtqSKKi1-dQbhZcJ5pzwlG9qwxduGzqI/s1600/colored+and+outined.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2kXtUHJvVmk1EWCKLM4QYyhwAlwaNV42gchnkhrLWBfvA3QkIA7WKsWL3HliULY0VLZku6QqTuLCE6utE7BL7Ty5FDOozB_DNe9zzHDOWygaJtqSKKi1-dQbhZcJ5pzwlG9qwxduGzqI/s400/colored+and+outined.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Colored and outlined, I thought of these as "entry level" pattern block puzzles.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">No color, just outlines. The prompt in the top left corner provides a nice way to combine this geometry activity with counting. I stood by and watched as a student worked for <i>over 10 minutes</i> trying to complete a similar puzzle. His perseverance was astonishing.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">These puzzles are more challenging because all the pattern block outlines are missing. It was interesting to watch the students work on these. They struggled at times, like the student in the video below. Watch how she fills the missing triangular space with a triangle...that doesn't fit in the outline.<br />
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<a href="https://vimeo.com/267491024">pattern block puzzle</a> from <a href="https://vimeo.com/user28403510">Joe Schwartz</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.<br />
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Some teachers asked their students to create their own pattern block puzzles...<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQmUPNZrR1JD4Qr4QLkGNRRGbAunD0QAWtCQDfYwhYRL58-0uqHw1NVvHBuQtHxQoQ7b_I1Tv-L_erZIUHvWN127L4dtMShMU6wmFA_c4VBe4Z7P5sgb5n7FT-XNvXFsAZNnNlAYl4Zy8/s1600/pattern+block+1+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="698" data-original-width="1600" height="276" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQmUPNZrR1JD4Qr4QLkGNRRGbAunD0QAWtCQDfYwhYRL58-0uqHw1NVvHBuQtHxQoQ7b_I1Tv-L_erZIUHvWN127L4dtMShMU6wmFA_c4VBe4Z7P5sgb5n7FT-XNvXFsAZNnNlAYl4Zy8/s640/pattern+block+1+copy.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Trace and color.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeCs1L8Wm10hVhJ0NiH7cxiMshHyL854YV_kRr5ujmpWQE4kFhmySAF6IaoexqMh32snVFMmvcIlkcCEJVIVV97Bl9xlwAm1rSwkbtVtQhRTXsp4GefF56V7LrIwosh4s3trmL-mfFgzw/s1600/pattern+block+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeCs1L8Wm10hVhJ0NiH7cxiMshHyL854YV_kRr5ujmpWQE4kFhmySAF6IaoexqMh32snVFMmvcIlkcCEJVIVV97Bl9xlwAm1rSwkbtVtQhRTXsp4GefF56V7LrIwosh4s3trmL-mfFgzw/s400/pattern+block+3.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Matching shapes.</td></tr>
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One teacher I've relied on heavily to help me navigate my way though the world of kindergarten math is Cristina Arena. She deserves a follow, people!! She took this idea to another level:<br />
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Ss create their own pattern block puzzles then their classmates recreate it! <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/mathchat?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#mathchat</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Kindergarten?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Kindergarten</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/JSchwartz10a?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@JSchwartz10a</a> <a href="https://t.co/Yn3JsykzfK">pic.twitter.com/Yn3JsykzfK</a></div>
— Cristina Arena (@arenaABC) <a href="https://twitter.com/arenaABC/status/988821910753562625?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2018</a></blockquote>
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Her students took pictures of their creations (one way to hold students accountable for their work) and posted them in their <a href="https://web.seesaw.me/">Seesaw </a>journals. Later, she printed them.<br />
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Other teachers combined pattern blocks with playdough. Another way to help those fine motor skills develop:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwE1y2_NpBQp5dXJJGyABQ0upNsNYEx3Ys0UaP_dHw4IzDAXRhhJ3BuUhqLmZHnhbH2X_lIyo0z7aKpw12a9v7OvfPVx0S_nCvW-whj9wI3l6aMkeo5LcDjOEVEpc2h0d6XsFN5ClGvGc/s1600/pd4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwE1y2_NpBQp5dXJJGyABQ0upNsNYEx3Ys0UaP_dHw4IzDAXRhhJ3BuUhqLmZHnhbH2X_lIyo0z7aKpw12a9v7OvfPVx0S_nCvW-whj9wI3l6aMkeo5LcDjOEVEpc2h0d6XsFN5ClGvGc/s400/pd4.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Copy a shape.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkMogM-vV7Uy0c8mGqyaO3XaLnXBUp7bSCtAzHuDPQTkxEVdlrE7RHXhyphenhyphenRdQO3KhTUJvzjNEDemkeg275S90WSJ99WzkHh1u-TI3mSfSTgG4_NGzr_I8b1NSGof4cKbv6w8MylhyphenhyphenjWvTw/s1600/with+pd+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkMogM-vV7Uy0c8mGqyaO3XaLnXBUp7bSCtAzHuDPQTkxEVdlrE7RHXhyphenhyphenRdQO3KhTUJvzjNEDemkeg275S90WSJ99WzkHh1u-TI3mSfSTgG4_NGzr_I8b1NSGof4cKbv6w8MylhyphenhyphenjWvTw/s400/with+pd+2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Do your own thing.<br />
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Navigating their way through Sarama and Clements's <a href="http://ncscdfoundationsofmathematics.ncdpi.wikispaces.net/file/view/Building+Block+Learning+Trajectories.pdf">progressions for the composition of 2-D shapes</a>, from piece assembler to picture maker, to shape composer and decomposer to everything between and beyond, these students were engaged in valuable learning experiences. Parks calls them <i>play based contexts (47), </i>and some teachers expressed concern that, should an administrator walk in and see their students playing<i> </i>around with pattern blocks,<i> </i>they might be called to task. Not to worry, however. According to Sarama and Clements,<br />
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<i> For early childhood, the area of geometry is the second most important area of mathematics learning. One could argue that this area--including spatial thinking--is as important as number. (160)</i><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic4iJFHJTwcX-hcW1-wNSYV6SIuuoAeQ-uIlLVjahe67FS-BuOypXCNsY59SfrHPUQLUZpRXxmKAGgQXFJHzNhggi_DdoaUXNNk6yf2bXHbgAHE2ii9zcomnMuNZaOVic9EzFUx6pvX_8/s1600/pattern+picture.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic4iJFHJTwcX-hcW1-wNSYV6SIuuoAeQ-uIlLVjahe67FS-BuOypXCNsY59SfrHPUQLUZpRXxmKAGgQXFJHzNhggi_DdoaUXNNk6yf2bXHbgAHE2ii9zcomnMuNZaOVic9EzFUx6pvX_8/s400/pattern+picture.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The kids agree.</td></tr>
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Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1907702537884089718.post-42694910951986296012018-04-22T14:25:00.000-07:002018-04-24T12:39:45.088-07:00Annie and Joe's NCSM Presentation<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXC236fc3aJXAa8MySyoSgIVksxPttgsycLiPkr786Si8Vjrbg6764KXMl98hlieqzm8kExVYh-rG0WJnCo2EQLtmo8oXGXvWaKqlWR5aFLEZ84F6dEiyqtFc_ynfND7mdp8Q2v-D3moY/s1600/description.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="422" data-original-width="766" height="176" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXC236fc3aJXAa8MySyoSgIVksxPttgsycLiPkr786Si8Vjrbg6764KXMl98hlieqzm8kExVYh-rG0WJnCo2EQLtmo8oXGXvWaKqlWR5aFLEZ84F6dEiyqtFc_ynfND7mdp8Q2v-D3moY/s320/description.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<b><br /></b><b> <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/17M1lqrxwvnLRpi_CW-CrrDeTiREdztWB/view"> Here's the PDF of the slides.</a></b><b><br /></b>
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<ul>
<li>Noticing and Wondering posts can be found <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2015/01/noticing-and-wondering-sampler.html">here</a> and<a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2016/05/we-noticed-we-wondered-now-what.html"> here</a>.</li>
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<li>Posts detailing my experiences with the <i>Tell Me Everything You Can...</i> prompt can be found <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2016/10/unknown-unknowns.html">here</a>, <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2017/03/it-depends-on-meaning-of-almost.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2017/01/natural-resources.html">here.</a></li>
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<li>Read about efforts to connect reading and math <a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2016/04/when-reading-met-math.html">here.</a></li>
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<li>I blogged about my PLC experience<a href="http://exit10a.blogspot.com/2015/06/learning-to-fish-plc.html"> here.</a></li>
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<li>Andrew Stadel's File Cabinet Three-Act is <a href="http://www.101qs.com/518-file-cabinet--act-1">here</a>.</li>
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<li>Numberless Word Problems are <a href="https://bstockus.wordpress.com/numberless-word-problems/">here</a>.</li>
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<li>Tina Cardone's post is<a href="http://drawingonmath.blogspot.com/2014/11/distance-graph.html"> here.</a></li>
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<li>Max Ray-Riek's Ignite: What We Talk About When We Talk About Teaching is <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxWpfVD182A">here.</a></li>
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<span id="goog_518846631"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a><span id="goog_518846632"></span><br />Joe Schwartzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02304083254248927187noreply@blogger.com0