From Grader to Writer

I recently had a revelation:  I make my students write all the time, so why don't I start doing some writing of my own?  I used to write quite a bit as a college student and had a few pieces published in the Bluffton College literary journal, but I haven't really written in the last eighteen years.  It always seemed that reading to prepare to teach and grading writing from my students took precedence over any writing of my own.  In the last few years I've started reading for pleasure much more (I've been on a Jeff Pearlman kick lately - The Bad Guys Won and Boys Will Be Boys about the 1986 New York Mets and the Dallas Cowboys of the early 90s), and I want my writing to follow the same path.

What really started me down this path was an article in The Courier before Christmas which talked about a writing workshop at the Findlay-Hancock County Library starting in January (click here to register for the next workshop on Wednesday, February 17).  Kay Cocklin, a retired teacher and published writer, is leading the workshop, and the first meeting on January 20 focused on developing a character.  My homework (and yes, I have already started it though it isn't due until February) is to write the first chapter of my story, and here's a snippet of what I have so far.

What I really like about this writing workshop is that I am the student again.  It's fun to see what I can do and realize where I struggle.  As I look at this image of the beginning of my chapter, I've already seen one mistake.  As a teacher, it's sometimes easy to forget the struggles students face when they are trying to complete their work.  Teachers need to have high expectations, but everyone needs to be allowed to make mistakes.  That's how we learn.

Will this chapter I'm writing for next month eventually develop into a New York Times best-seller?  Will I become a world-renowned author, traveling to book signings at Barnes & Noble?  If I do, it will be exciting.  If I don't, I'll gain experience as a writer which I can pass on to my students so maybe one of them will become famous.  By the way, if any students want to sign up for the workshop and surprise me with their presence in February, I'll be a very happy teacher!

It Has Been Too Long

It has been too long since I last posted to my blog.  Why has it been so long?  I feel like I've been buried with work, but is that just an excuse I'm making? Do my students feel like they are buried but still do what I ask of them? These and other questions are constantly running through my mind.  Am I the best teacher I can be? Am I challenging all of my students?  Am I frustrating any of my students because I am pushing them too fast?  Am I too strict in some situations and too lax in others?  How much credence should I give to my students' performances related to their state-mandated student learning objectives? 

I often wonder whether other teachers have all of these questions.  I'm an eighteen-year teaching veteran. Shouldn't I have all of the answers?  I hope these questions are all evidence of my desire to not become one of those teachers who "hangs it up" and coasts to retirement.  I don't want to be that teacher just like I don't want my students to coast to graduation and then look back at their high school experiences and realize they didn't do their best or have teachers like me push them.

As soon as I have all of the answers, I'll be concerned. Until then, I'll do my best to reach my students and help them excel as 21st century learners.

Year Eighteen - The Teaching Saga Continues

As we embark on another school year, I'm overwhelmed, excited, and fearful all at the same time.  I'm overwhelmed because I have so many things to do to get ready for this year.  I still have to update the syllabi for my classes, update my lesson plans for the start of the year, etc.  Meanwhile, I'm excited because of the new technology opportunities which present themselves every year, my new

whiteboard table, the exercise balls students will be able to use as chairs, and the freedom my students will have in my classroom this year. Finally, I'm fearful because I want to make sure I am giving my students every opportunity they need to be successful later in high school and life.  What if I'm the cause of a student's inability to excel in college or find a job?  That scares me.

Regardless of my feelings, it's good to know my students and I have the opportunity to do something great this year.  Will one of my students create some cool Kickstarter campaign like this one trying to create a documentary about the life of poet Emily Dickinson?  Will I push myself and my students to excel to the point that I will win the National Teacher of the Year award (English teachers have won three of the last four years - I'm just saying)?  Will we all learn something new this year, like that there's such a thing as a reflection nebula (I'm not sure why we would learn this in English, but you catch my drift)?  Will my yearbook staff earn our school's first-ever Gold Crown from the Columbia Scholastic Press Association?

I don't know the answers to all of these questions and millions of others could be asked, but that is what makes the field of education one of the best places to be in the world.  If you are a student, work hard so you are prepared to leave your mark on the world.  If you are a teacher, positively impact the minds of students so they can dream big.  If you are an administrator, support your teachers and students so they can accomplish greatness.  If you are a parent or community member, be there when a student needs someone to read his/her blog post (I am going to be asking my community members to do that this year).  We can all do something to make this a memorable year.

Motivating Students to Fight Through Adversity

Adversity is something everyone in the world faces on a daily basis.  Students face adversity at school when they don't earn the grades they desire, teachers face adversity when they can't find the perfect way to convey important information to students, and school administrators (at least in Ohio) face adversity when trying to find time to complete all of the necessary teacher evaluations.  Despite the fact it is so prevalent today in our schools and world, it seems many people don't do well handling adversity.  How can we motivate students to not give up when they face adversity?

One article which might help the process is about the inventor of Scotch tape.  Zachary Crockett, who wrote an article about the inventor on priceonomics, describes how Richard Drew quit college, took a job at 3M, tried repeatedly to find the right mix of ingredients to create a tape for auto body shops to use when painting cars, and eventually created what is probably the most famous tape in the world today.  Would it have been easy for him to fold when he faced adversity?  It absolutely would have been, but he didn't give up. 

If nothing else, hopefully this article will help people persevere when adversity seems overwhelming.  If it leads someone to develop some futuristic product like Richard Drew did so long ago, adversity will have lost again.

To What Lengths Should Teachers Go to Prevent Plagiarism?

Plagiarism is one of the plagues scourging not only the American education system, but also America itself.  Whether it is a Montana congressman or Notre Dame football players, it seems that passing off someone else's work as their own is something too many people are trying to do.

When something becomes a major problem in our country, something should be done to stop it.  When drugs became a major problem in the 1980s, President Reagan began his war on drugs.  In recent years as human trafficking has become a major problem in Northwest Ohio because of its proximity to I-75 and the Ohio Turnpike, law enforcement agencies have increased their efforts to fix the problem.

While plagiarism isn't anywhere near the importance of the wars on drug use and human trafficking, it is a problem which needs to be fixed.  College professors and high school teachers are leading the way through the use of a variety of plagiarism detection tools like Turnitin with more success every year. 

In an article about plagiarism from NPR, students seem to have mixed emotions about high-tech plagiarism detection, and many teachers appear to have the same ambivalence.  Likewise, I at times struggle to know if a student simply doesn't know any better or if there was intent to cheat.  Those times of ambivalence are often few and far between, though, because most of the examples of plagiarism I find are pretty clear cut:  the student has copied and pasted large blocks of word-for-word text from a document.  Is that ever accidental?  No. 

Will Van Buren ever start using a plagiarism detection service to identify plagiarists?  Would it deter students from plagiarizing?  Would the service ever falsely identify a student as a plagiarist?  These are all questions we would need to consider if we ever did go that direction. 

I'm interested in any opinions anyone has regarding plagiarism in general and plagiarism detection services.  It's a problem education professionals cannot avoid because we must prepare our students for college and beyond.

College Textbooks - Buy or Rent?

This post is more for the seniors, but it is eventually going to affect anyone going to college.  Is it better to buy or rent college textbooks?  This article from The New York Times discuss that quandary which many of you will face in the near future.  After reading it, you will hopefully be able to make an informed decision that will make those textbooks as economical as possible.

Will Failure Make You More Attractive to Future Employers?

This article about Amazon owner Jeff Bezos in Entrepreneur magazine discusses a shift he has undergone when it comes to hiring for his company.  He actually likes hiring people because they have failed.  Read the article to find out why and what other companies are looking at failure the same way.