The Culture of Poverty

I admit that I have never known poverty in its most intimate sense. I have never known need. But I do understand how the culture of a family is created. I come from a family that has always valued education and entrepreneurship. My great-great grandfather helped found a college in Minnesota shortly after immigrating to the United States from Norway, and one of my grandmothers attended that college years later, graduating in 1929. Even as the eldest daughter! The other examples are numerous and significant; all have contributed to a culture in my family.

Understanding this also helps me understand that an opposite culture is equally powerful. And in making sense of this, I also realize that poverty is not a problem to be fixed but a culture to be understood. The challenges of poverty are not overcome with band-aid programs in the school, community, or government but through a cultural and social shift in how we respond to those challenges.

I have two significant take-aways from the first two chapters in Teaching with Poverty in Mind by Eric Jensen: first, the impact of poverty on language development; second, the importance of education in breaking the cycle of poverty. As a language arts teacher, I have read about how poverty affects language development in children and how that impact can last for years, even a lifetime. Indeed, I can see the effects of poverty in a child's ability to read and write even in their last years of high school. Unfortunately, addressing that effectively in the classroom during the time I have to interact with those kids is incredibly difficult. I want to help those kids, but knowing how to do so is a challenge. Right not I try to encourage kids to come in for extra support during writing assignments; I offer as much assistance as I can during the writing process via electronic and face-to-face dialogue; and I make allowances for the students who simply may not be able to write at the level that is expected. I don't know how fair or correct any of that is, but it is what my gut tells me is right right now. I honestly hope I learn some other ways to manage my response to these students and their unique challenges as I read the book and listen to discussions.

Education seems to be the most logical and impactful way to break the cycle of poverty. When I consider the stories of people two or three generations older than I, I hear this point often. Many people who lived during the Depression seemed to see education as the ticket out of poverty, and they taught their children the importance of school and learning. What is different now? Is there no hope when living in the darkness of poverty? Is there no understanding of or little belief in what an education can do?

My friend knew poverty as a child growing up outside of Rugby in the 1950s and 60s. His mother and father, however, also knew the value of an education and drilled that knowledge into their children. Of the three children, one is now a retired federal judge and another was the president of a private university for twenty years. What I truly don't understand yet is how the culture of one family can be like this while the culture of another family can be so suspicious or seemingly unaccepting of education and its benefits. What can I do as teacher to help kids realize the power of education?

Changing the culture of poverty is a tremendous task but one we must tackle if we want to help each kid succeed.

Learning or just doing?

I just finished an experiment with formative assessment in my comp class. I have had students read 1984 for several years now. I have always struggled to find effective ways to have students show their thinking while reading. I ask them to journal; they take quizzes; they complete an extension project that allows them to show their creativity; they lead discussion. Over the years it has become clear that no one method works for all nor does the variety reach all. So I keep trying to hit as many as I can with something that speaks to their strengths. 

One of the major components of this class is being able to communicate what you are thinking after reading a text. Two things come out of this: knowledge of the text and connections to current society or personal life. I think this type of writing is becoming quite common in post-secondary education, and former students tell me that doing a lot of this is helpful for them. With that in mind, I think it is crucial that students do the same while reading the novel. Often, I asked kids to journal but wouldn't tell them when I was collecting a them. I found that the journals didn't really reflect great thinking--only that kids put something on paper no matter if it was good or bad. I knew I needed to do something different. 

So after reading the book on formative assessment, I tried to incorporate those ideas into this class's requirement. I assigned journals at the beginning of the book with the explanation that each student needed to complete 10 journals by the end of the book. (It comes out to about 2 or 3 each week we are studying the text.) I asked kids to use a type of journaling we have been using all year, blog, or simply ask questions then attempt to answer them given what they know as almost high school graduates. The format was flexible. The quality of the journals was not. Right away I explained that I wouldn't allow them to write journals that were of poor quality. If the kids didn't write a journal that I believed they were capable of producing, they had to try again. When kids turned in weak journals, I pointed out what made it weak. I asked for clarification. I made suggestions. I didn't re-teach material; I just made kids accountable for the quality of work they produced. 

I also kept track of how many quality journals I had received from each student on the board. It was public, but again--accountability for learning. How did it work? Well, I think. Was it perfect? No. Some didn't finish 10 journals. Some never wrote much of quality. But when I asked them to come in so I could help them be more successful, NO ONE took me up on my offer.

Some kids want to learn and their journals reflected that. They asked phenomenal questions. They thought about things I never had. I love those moments that I learn from kids! But some did the minimum to get by. Some never took this as an opportunity. They may not have seen the value, but isn't that why I am paid to be the expert in the room? Somebody decided that I must know a little bit about college writing, so that is why I teach the class. The kids don't really get to decide that. 

I guess what I learned from the class and my experiment with these journals is that checking for their understanding of the material via formative assessment ONLY works if students see the value in what they are doing. If they don't, it doesn't matter how great a lesson, assessment, or activity is--the students won't put in the time. And this realization has been plaguing me all throughout this school year. I can do everything "right" in the classroom, but it is still up to the students if they want to learn or not. I cannot, in the end, do it for them. Nor would I.

But I will continue to teach with the learners in mind. If I don't, I will spend an extraordinary amount of time on students who can't, don't , or won't see the value of what is taught in the classroom.

Formative Assessment

I have been experimenting with different types of formative assessment throughout the year. Some have worked well, and others have flopped. So far, there aren't many patterns for either category. With the assessment for this month's class, I knew I wanted to check students' analysis of argument texts. We have practiced text analysis throughout the year, so I fully expected that this assessment would show continued improvement and development. Wow. So wrong.

I handed out two essays about a related topic and asked kids to answer three or four questions about each text and four questions that prompted them to compare the texts--both in content and mode. This kind of analysis isn't new to them. When I read through their answers, however, I found their depth of analysis to be disappointing, at best. Most wrote single sentence answers that focused primarily on whether or not they "liked" the text. This was, of course, not what I had hoped to see.

But here is the real shocker: when I talked with the kids about their responses, I asked if they genuinely forgot how to analyze and synthesize two texts. They responded that they had not forgotten; they had merely decided that they didn't think the assignment mattered. We proceeded to have a good discussion about that. I learned that they believed that analysis wasn't going to impact their upcoming paper for me, so they didn't spend the time doing what they perceived as busy work. When I explained WHY I asked them to do what I did, they realized that maybe I was right. Yet, at that point I chose not to have them do the assessment over because that would have been busy work. I do this kind of analysis several times throughout the semester. By now, I know who gets it, who still struggles, and who does the bare minimum. But I continue to require this because I believe it is essential to keep reading complex texts and analyze them accordingly--a daily task in college.

Lesson learned? The why is just as crucial as the how and the what. I know this, but clearly I need to provide the rationale EVERY time. The assessment, no matter how good, won't tell you anything if all the parts aren't firing correctly. Great assessment design has to be deliberate. If it isn't, the assessment won't tell you anything, or worse, it will tell you erroneous information.

Open Minds

Standards-based grading sounds like a great idea.  I love that my students and my own children would be given feedback about what they can and cannot do.  That's valuable information for anyone.  Knowing this, I truly cannot decide if it would be best to jump into the world of SBG with both feet or wade in slowly.

With anything new, there is much to be gained from a whole-hearted, all-at-once dive.  It demonstrates a commitment that simply cannot be replicated in a slower approach.  The dive, however, has pitfalls, which is why change is often analyzed to death before it is even attempted.  The incessant "what ifs" are paralyzing--so much so that we may never do anything--and stagnation sets in with its own numbness.

So what do we do?  First, I think we have to figure out what our goal is.  What are we really after?  Are we pursuing strong student achievement?  Are we pursuing positive school culture?  Are we pursuing success beyond our doors?  One would think that the answer to all of these things would be, "YES!" but without a sense of what we want, we will never know where to go.  I often tell my writing students that drafting without an outline or at least a list of what they want to accomplish is a bit like taking a trip without a map or GPS.  It can be fun, but it can also be disastrous.

Here's what I see...
1. We have, in core subject areas, examined the new CCSS.  We have prioritized what is important to us.
2. We are now developing our assessments.  This is proving to be an incredibly slow process for us in ELA because it is so complex and proficiency isn't a checkbox.
3. Once those assessments are developed and used for a period of time, then I think our next logical step will be SBG.  To make the shift prior to that is a bit like putting the cart before the horse: we are still operating with traditional assessments designed under a traditional grading system.  To mix traditional assessments with a different reporting system wouldn't necessarily translate effectively.  However, if we wait until we know what our assessments can tell us, then we can begin to figure out how to report that to parents and students.

I have a tendency to be a jump-in-feet-first kind of person but not here.  I think real change has to be methodical and calculated because this involves so many other groups besides us professionals in the school building.  Transitions are never easy, and I believe this transition may be one of the most complex I have faced in my career so far.  Maneuvering in the midst of the transition, as we are now, really isn't fun, but I think there are so many in the profession who see the value of a whole new paradigm.  It will be exciting to see what we can do!

A Foot in Each

I have been reading about grades, grading procedures, and standards for the past several months. The consensus from all the reading: we are getting it wrong. Yet the suggestions for repairs are widely varied and far from agreed upon. Even so, I have committed to trying some of the ideas to discover the impact in my classroom.  But that commitment has caused me to feel as though I have one foot in each realm: the traditional and the standards-based.  While these realms can and do work together, the transition I am in right now is causing me to feel torn between the two as I reconcile how they fit.  I want grades to be a reflection of learning (not compliance), but the grade in my classes is interpreted as more than just information about learning.

First, I have eliminated reduced grades for late work. Instead, I am forcing kids to come in during what is typically a free period for most seniors. I do this through our weekly eligibility--and taking away their senior privileges. The method is somewhat effective. Some students have already lost privileges because of low grades in other classes, so these students aren't motivated by this.  However, the vast majority is.  I have shifted my focus on the deadline to the responsibility of completing the work.  And students seem to be responding.  As with everything, there are a few students who don't want to do the work.  Period.  But most do--I think they want to show me what they are capable of, and I know they don't want to continue spending unnecessary time with me.

The second important change I have made is in creating standards-based rubrics for writing assignments.  Writing is part craft and part technical skill.  Merging these two in a rubric is challenging; further, it is difficult to explain the subjective craft of writing at different levels of proficiency.  Simply put, some students already far out-pace their classmates when it comes to craft.  These students are naturally gifted with words, but that doesn't mean that they cannot improve.  I am beginning to think I need a rubric for the varying levels of talent--and that just sounds like a nightmare.  I compare it to a music teacher having a student in class who is a prodigy.  The music teacher can't really use the same set of standards for that student that the teacher would use for others.  But how would that look? I know I would have been upset if I hadn't been given the "high-level" rubric. Additionally, I need to examine the writing of students with writing/reading disabilities differently than other students.  I wouldn't want those students to feel as though they are not good enough if they somehow learn they have a separate rubric.  So the practicality of this is a struggle.

But what I have noticed is that students appreciate the specific feedback the rubric can provide.  They can easily see the area in which they struggled or excelled in that particular assignment.  The students also know ahead of time what the "I can" statements are that are associated with the assignment as well as the levels of proficiency.  I think (I hope) this takes some of the mystery out of the assessment process for them.  I know I often wondered how a professor or teacher arrived at a particular letter grade for a writing assignment.

These two significant changes have highlighted other issues though.  Many of my graded assignments are still very traditional.  They are practice for the technical skills of writing: grammar, usage, mechanics, organization, etc.  If I didn't include these assignments in the overall grade--if I only used summative assessments as is suggested in several sources--the quarterly grades for almost all of my students would have been much lower.  So having a foot in the standards-based world has presented other challenges.

Because our culture expects traditional letter grades, I am trying to figure out how both sides can be satisfied.  Letter grades for seniors can affect scholarship awards and college admissions.  I still don't see how to blend the two--traditional grades and standards-based--for certain populations.  In addition, because several students take my class as a dual-credit option, their letter grades follow them for the foreseeable future on their official college transcript. That is an important issue that would need to be addressed before I can feel completely comfortable with standards-based grading.

Are grades a reflection of learning?

The inspiration for this month’s blog occurred Sunday night at about 10p.m. while I sat on the floor of my daughter’s bedroom—frustrated, sad, angry, and disillusioned.  Why the extreme emotions?  Why as I sat on the floor?  Just…why?

Annika is a pretty good reader.  She isn’t a fast reader, and neither am I, but she is a good reader.  She understands what she reads and can ask some good questions about the material once she is done.  Because she reads well, she has to meet an Accelerated Reader goal that is challenging.  Unfortunately, though, she doesn’t see this as an opportunity or an achievement; she sees it as a task—a job to be completed.  The joy of reading and losing herself in a book has been stripped by the demand to read books that add up to a certain number of points.  Her perspective has been changed by the grade attached to the assignment.

She started reading one of her American Girl books on Sunday afternoon.  A few pages into the book, she stopped, looked up the book on AR, and decided to quit reading then and there even though she had been enjoying the story.  Why?  Because the book wasn’t “worth enough points” in her estimation.  She didn’t see the value in reading a book that she felt didn’t help her reach her goal for the quarter quickly.  While I acknowledge that we all need to determine the value of continuing with a project, why are we quietly encouraging our students to only do a task if there is a reward or grade attached?  Why are we educating them out of learning?

Kids are naturally inquisitive; they want to learn.  But at some point in their educational lives, they lose that natural desire, and I believe they do so because they are more concerned about the grade than they are about the learning.  I have had seniors say, “Just tell me what I need to do to get an A.  I don’t care about anything else.”  Really?

So what do we do as classroom teachers and school leaders?  How do we put the learning back in education?

I believe standards based grading will help, but that alone doesn’t inspire inquisitiveness.  Problem-based learning is another methodology for which I have high hopes.  PBL allows students to demonstrate their learning through projects that they develop based on the objectives needing to be reached or the problem needing to be solved.  But like I discussed in the last blog, the true shift occurs in the whole paradigm of how schools grade and how society wants schools to grade.

The other idea that holds promise for me and could potentially bridge this gap is explained on pages 65 and 66 of Reeves’ book, Elements of Grading.  Here, he explains that assessments of standards can be converted into grades using a three-, four-, or five-point scale.  I especially appreciate his explanation of letter grades:

A=At least four assessments with a final score of 4 and two assessments with a final score of at least 3

B=At least four assessments with a final score of at least 3 and two assessments with a final score of at least 2

                C=At least three assessments with a final score of at least 3 (66).

I can easily see how I can convert this into something useable for essays, particularly if I break down the elements of the essay into separate assessments.  For example, I can assess structure and grammar; organizational techniques; content; and diction/voice separately and convert that to one grade.  This would also, hopefully, help students see which part of the essay needs improvement.  It won’t be perfect, but like a methods professor often told us: “If we had found the perfect method, we would be using it by now.  Until then, we have to keep working at it.”

 

While this concept of converting to standards based grading and blending it with traditional reporting methods isn’t without its pitfalls, it certainly is worthy of experimentation.  I am looking forward to the chance to examine the possibilities with student scores when I “play” with my gradebook this summer.  I want to see how these shifts affect real kids in real situations before I implement them in the classroom.

Grades need to assess learning.  (And a student who doesn’t turn in an assignment isn’t demonstrating learning.) I have become a firm believer in this statement while I acknowledge that making that shift in reality is challenging.  But I know it is essential to move toward a better system for everyone, including Annika.

The Culture of Grades and Changing the Solar System

 

              Our society expects it: when children go to school, they are graded in return for completed assignments.  Our college and university system demands it: the performance of a student is reduced to the numbers of GPA, class rankings, and test scores.  If secondary schools were to change its system of showing assessment of students, society would notice, and the feedback would undoubtedly be all over the media.  So why now?  I think schools are facing tremendous scrutiny from everywhere, so all parts of the system are under examination.  Tradition is no longer a good enough reason to continue our practices, but neither is it acceptable to change without a clear understanding of what our purpose, goals, and expectations are.

                When I begin class in the fall, I explain to the seniors who have elected to take our dual credit/college preparatory English class that, "Every essay you write begins at a C."  Inevitably, the looks on some of the faces range from relieved to terrified.  But let me explain as I try to do with them.

1.  I want the students to focus on the feedback I write on their rough drafts and use that to improve their writing.  That is my primary focus each year: improvement of current skills.  I try to work with each student to make him/her a more focused, organized, technically stronger writer before college.

2.  If I graded each paper comparatively--that is, comparing what one student writes with what another writes--I would "give" A's to the same students who have always received them and C's to the weaker writers.  I don't think that's fair.  I try diligently not to compare students' essays.  I only assess based on what I believe that student is capable of producing.

3.  Now, that last sentence is sticky.  What if that student that I am pushing to do better simply can't?  I have students write several short, less intense essays at the beginning of the year (I call them responses) so I can get a feel for how each student writes.  (And don't tell them, but they basically get points for getting it done according to directions--nothing else.)  I couldn't have done this when I started my career; I simply didn't have the experience or knowledge of student writing that I do now.

4.  Finally, I want the student to focus on improvement--not the grade.  And therein lay the struggle.  Kids, and occasionally their parents, want the grade.  I find that students who are inordinately focused on the grade are typically the students who are at the top of their class with perfect or nearly perfect 4.0 GPA's.  Their focus has been removed from the learning.  

                So, back to that C on the essay...what I explain after I talk about the value of feedback and the overall goal of improvement is that an A signifies excellence, superiority, and perfection.  Writing is nearly always imperfect because it is subjective.  I have to give a letter grade, or at least a percentage which is translated into a letter grade, so I do.  A student who demonstrates several strong elements beyond what I expect of him/her moves up from that C; a student who doesn't meet my expectation of him/her moves down.  In nearly every case of a student who ends up with a grade below a C, he/she admits to not spending much time on the writing, not following directions, or not focusing on my feedback.

                The problem about this approach should be obvious: it is all about me.  It is all based upon what I think.  What I judge a student to be capable of.  What I value as a composition teacher.  Standards based grading may alleviate some of that, but not all.  As someone who has been examining and discussing the new Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts, there is very little about what "good" writing looks like.  The elements included in the standards can certainly be added to the current curriculum, but they don't really help anyone assess more fairly or effectively.  That still comes down to me.

                I work hard to give my students valuable feedback during the writing process.  I can respond during writing, after a rough draft, during revision, and after the final.  By the time I read the final draft, I may have read a piece of writing a minimum of 3 times.  However, there are always those students who don't have anything on paper until the day the rough draft is due.  I don't read those essays nearly as much.  Do they deserve less feedback simply because they don't participate in the process like others?  Is their writing somehow less important?  And what if they don't turn in a rough draft at all?  Should I put a zero in the grade book or should I call that their "choice"?

                And the kicker for me: what about the student who doesn't turn in a final draft on time?  Does he or she deserve to be punished for not following the schedule?  (A schedule that is determined with their input!)  I have a really difficult time justifying the same grade for the student who does what is asked of them when it is asked as the student who does the work a week later than everyone else.  How is that fair to the 30 or 40 students who did the work on time?  Sometimes there are extenuating circumstances, but sometimes there aren't.  I wonder what the other 40 students would say if we asked them this question.

                I understand what the theorists and researchers say, but I also understand what I believe society expects of schools.  I would like every kid to learn the skills and concepts and have that learning reflected in a grade, but I also know that changing the culture of grading is a bit like asking the sun to come up in the west.  So how about it, sun?  If schools can change, so can you!