TIR Blog Post 1

Blog Assignment: Write about two things that are going well in your classroom that you are proud of. Write about two things in your classroom that you wish to improve. What steps will you take to improve these items?

Hello Dee Dee and any other Rio Salado readers :) Just a little bit about myself, I've been teaching at the college level since 2008, mostly in creative writing but also ENG101-ENG105. I feel very fortunate in that teaching has been something I've been about to learn about and manipulate in a somewhat tangible manner for some time. I taught for one year at a charter high school as an adjunct, at AAEC Charter High School in Prescott Valley. That was my first foray into the K-12 world and I feel like they taught me more than I taught them ;) I swore off teaching high school, but you know what they say: If you want to hear God laugh, tell Him your plans. I went back to adjunct only status at Yavapai College in Prescott and taught for a few years hoping to make full time, and to help pay the bills I took a summer opportunity with Upward Bound at Embry Riddle Aeronautical University where a colleague said Tri-City College Prep High School was looking for an English teacher. (Additionally, it was the middle of July when he told me this.) At first I was very hesitant, mostly from the individual experiences I'd had at AAEC, but eventually I gave the principal a call. The rest, as they say, is history, and I've been teaching there for over a year now. I absolutely love it. My reservations about teaching high school are school policies at this charter school so I have found my home, a school that I completely adore and stand behind. Most of my students at TCP are high-achieving students who apply (and are accepted) to schools like Berkeley, London College, MIT, and other Ivies and international colleges. 80% of our students graduate with honors (though we made the honors qualifications tougher), and every year several seniors graduate at Yavapai College with an Associates Degree before the graduate from high school (a mere scheduling detail, but fun for them to say nonetheless). Everything I love about teaching college students is here at TCP without any of the more adult-like concerns of teaching adult students (registered sex offenders, ex-cons, threatening or aggressive students, etc.). I still teach creative writing at Yavapai College (on Monday nights, so effectively I work 11 hours straight on Mondays), and sometimes my high school students seek out my college classes on campus. I truly have the best of both worlds, and though working full-time and near-full-time jobs feels like it kills me some weeks, I absolutely love it.

That said, probably one thing I'm the most proud of is a practiced curriculum. Because this is my third total year teaching high school Junior English, I've now been able to play around with different forms of assessments for American Literature and I'm really happy with the books and with the assessments I've created. Right now my students are debating themes in The Scarlet Letter, themes such as "Should Hester Prynne have not been able to raise Pearl?" and "Who is the true antagonist of the story?" These kinds of topics allow students to pick an affirmative and negative side and then to tap into bigger issues such as child custody, the foundations of morality (who decides what is moral?), "is there any justification for evil/immoral acts?", "what is the role of corporal punishment in our society?", and "should punishment be private or public?" It's fascinating to see their minds participate in organized critical thinking when I approach each debate team and pose "what if?" questions to them. This is one of the best parts about teaching English: I get to teach them how to think for themselves, and how to think on their feet.

Another thing that is going very well is in my Dual Enrollment courses. I'm teaching something the high school calls "College Composition" which Yavapai College recognizes as ENG101 in the Fall and ENG102 in the Spring. This, too, I've taught before (several times) so the only thing that is different is the setting and the pacing. (I'm used to 3 hours a week --not 5 hours a week.) What I think is going particularly well is that last year's juniors --my students for Junior English-- proved to be vastly dominated by gifted students, students who challenged me to make the work more challenging for them. This class is by far the most advanced junior class I've ever seen and they seemed bored toward the end of last year because they weren't as intellectually engaged as they would have liked. What I am happy to see is that they seem well-challenged this year. The work I give them is not too difficult, but I am using a more advanced vocabulary, more rigor in writing, and I'm pushing them more in a grammatical context. What I think they especially love is that I allow them to select their own essay topics: I give them a handfull of potential topics that are pretty vague and they write a thesis of their own choosing related to that.

As far as things I could improve on, I'm delighted to see that this year's seniors are more intellectually engaged, and I'm already planning how I'm going to introduce more rigor to the Junior English curriculum in the Spring to smooth over that transition a bit more. I've always said that with so many years teaching college under my belt, my primary mission is to get these college prep kids ready for college. I feel like I could do a better job prepping the juniors for College Comp in the Spring.

The other thing I think I could do better in keeping with those college-motivated lessons is that I need to be better about following my syllabus policies. I've always heard from my deans that you can "be kinder than the syllabus but never harsher." Indeed, each student does present a case-by-case basis, but I've always been a no late work, no extra credit, no exceptions kind of teacher. Last week I think I set up expectations incorrectly in a College Comp student by accepting more than one late assignment (my syllabus says I'll accept one all semester), so when she approached me on Monday about wanting to turn in Monday's assignment late, I said no and she cried. Now, I know that students crying is always an occupational hazard, but I couldn't help but to feel a little guilty that by not following my syllabus policies, I had altered her expectations of the course. I said no, that I wouldn't accept the assignment late, and I'm glad I stood behind that rule: I really do think I'm preparing them for a harsher collegiate world where you won't get to turn in any late assignments with some teachers. Especially in the professional world, if you're a lawyer and you're supposed to have an opening statement ready for court on Monday morning, you can't walk in and say, "Your Honor, I'm sorry but I had a really crazy weekend and I am not ready for today. Will you grant an exception?" I realize that is hyperbolic, but I really do want to get these kids ready for a scarier reality than they've been exposed to. So many teachers are so nice about making exceptions that these kids really have a rude awakening in college and what is already a tough transition becomes sometimes traumatizing. At least if I set up harsher expectations, the one exception can be seen as a grace and not as an entitlement.

Thanks for reading!