A letter to my metamorphosis class

I know you will be wonderful adults. I know many of you will become professionals in the fields of your choices. I know many of you will be still dancing and screaming and clapping even later in life. I also know that all you successes will come to you harder than to some other people; you will have to do more in order to get the same. Why? Because it seems that those people who can show self-discipline and self-control get it with minimal effort and when they work hard they become unstoppable.
Nature or gods give you your talent, but then you have to apply self-discipline and self-control to develop your talent and achieve your real heights. You already heard a lot about how hard you have to sit at the table and study and read, and solve problems. Today I want to talk about what if you have a talent that requires strong muscles and cool head?
This video is about modern dancers. How much do you think they had to practice and how much sweat was poured before they became this good?

What about this guy? How much self-sacrifice and self-discipline did he have to apply? Now guy like him teach you a step-by-step process, was there somebody for him? I really think he developed all these tricks by falling getting up and moving on.

This one is called mountain biker: Did he ever fall?

How much self-discipline and self-control these guys had to apply to achieve these heights? Was it easy?
Maybe yes maybe no. They found their passion and their purpose. And then through pain and sweat they defined gravity. There are physics teachers who use these examples to study Newton’s Laws. There are scientists who work with this people to study human physiology. Can you imagine how strong their muscles must be?

To achieve a success it’s absolutely necessary to stop singing and dancing and start working from time to time. I love the fact that you are so happy and jolly, now I want to see you concentrated on your goals and achieve them. By the way, setting your goals is a hard work too, especially at your age. What do you want? What do you want for yourself? I am not talking about what your parents want or what your teachers want for you. What do you want? Let’s go and get that.

Do you see how much they enjoy the strength of their bodies. They also enjoy unbelievable view from up there.
Am I becoming an inspirational speaker? Ha

Who are the Judges? And Where are the Rubrics?

For those who do not know what Rubrics are - it's a new term in teaching, parameters for grading your creative work. It is a list or a chart that shows the students what they will be graded on as they hand in their work.

Recently I read an article about teachers. In that article american teachers were compared to the teachers from other countries and were given a very disappointing low grade. The teachers from other countries were so much better, they even had better grades when they themseves were students. I was reading and thinking: who are those superbeings? How do they know who is a good teacher and who is not a good teacher? Where did they place the Rubricks to compare us with each other?

Later another thought came to me. Again I was reading an article, but this time somebody tried to tell me which chocolate chip cookie was the best. And again I marveled about this superbeing who knows what I like in my cookies. But then I thought that my Rubrics for my favorite cookie is very different from somebody else Rubrics for the same cookie. I love them chowy and soft, others love them cranchy and hard. How can we put those things in the same Rubrics. No we need different cookies. I love the fact that I can be in a different mood and get a different cookie. Nobody can tell which cookie is the best.

This is why competitions do not work any longer. They do not work at a work place, they do not work at schools. Competitions still work in sports and only for entertaining the fans. They still help the organizers to collect a lot of money. But then those fans go home and go to work and they do not compete there they cooperate. They help each other. They brainstorm together to achieve even higher heights, some that were not achievable by one competing individual alone.

Back to poor bad teachers of America. I know these people, I work with them for many years, I know how many really bad teachers I met in my 23 years of teaching. The numer is 3. Out of these 3, 2 left the job, and the third one already retired.

If we are so bad, why is that every country is sending us their teachers and researchers to learn our methods? If we are so bad, why do they want to learn how we do it? If we are so bad, why do we have Classroom 2.0 and Future of Education, and Ning, and Wiki, and Google - all are here, the headquaters are located in the United States.

But the main thought I want to deliver here is that nobody is good for everybody. I might be a great teacher, but there are always some students with who my methods do not work. I am bad with those who need my instructions at all times and has no initiative. I try to teach my students how to be independent learners and once in a while I meet a kid who watches me and wants me to tell him or her what to do all the time. I give them less and less instructions as they grow into their independent routine. So here I am a bad teacher, because I didn't tell the kid what to do and was surprised when he asked. I am hard and cranchy with a kid like that, but chwoy and soft with those who jumped in and started to create.

So again, who is the judge? and who writes the Rubrics?

What is your goal as a parent?

I’ve been thinking about writing this blog for a while. I consider myself an experienced parent. I even think sometimes that I am a successful one. Of course, I had felt differently about my skills as a parent before, but the longer I was a mother the better I did the job. Today I am just enjoying and ripping the fruits of my success. Why do I think that I am a successful parent? My children are very young, they are not completely settled in their lives, they will have to go through many difficult changes, and they will have to acquire many life skills. They do not always agree with me. They do things their own way. They make their own decisions and live the consequences. What is my role?
When we are young parents we imagine our perfect kids. What is a perfect kid? Is it the kid who is always obeying what you tell them? Is it a kid who does all the chores? Makes the bed? Completes the homework? Is polite with adults? What happens with those obedient kids when they become adults?
One of the stories my husband used to tell me about his teenage years stuck in my head. I always tell this story to illustrate how little some parents know about their children if they are trying to bring up their perfect kids. He was in ninth grade. He had been smoking for a couple years by then and, when going out with his classmates, he used to drink some cheap wine. Here, I have to add that my husband died before he reached his 42nd year from alcoholic hepatitis and bleeding pancreas. He did quit smoking though a few years before that. So the story went that his mother regularly and publicly was saying to everybody she knew that Her Son would never smoke and Her Son would never drink. She did have a pretty good idea of how her perfect kid would be. He used to sit next to her, listening to her image of him and nod.
Now my children tell me that same thing is happening in almost every family they know: the kids live their lives without telling their parents anything.
First, I have to tell you I am not judging anybody, we all work, we all have to feed the kids, we have to cook, clean, wash, pick up and drop dead every day and day after day. Even on vacation we are not really resting we have to ran around watch them and check if they are safe all the time.
You may not agree with me, but I consider my first success as a parent happened when my daughters discussed with me if they should start smoking at 11. The peer pressure was unbelievable, all the kids in these suburbs, where we had just moved, had been smoking since second grade. I used my persuasion talent and we managed to resist the peer pressure and postpone that by almost a year. I knew when they finally did start to smoke. They asked me questions after they saw their first porn film. They told me when they had sex for the first time. They had very few secrets from me and whatever they didn’t tell me they always told to each other. I think I am very lucky parent. I could share my values with my kids because we discussed everything that happened to them and had no secrets.
It was not easy. My heart was dropping somewhere into my knees after every new secret they told me. I had to watch not to start screaming and breaking furniture. But I promised them to be their safe heaven and I made sure that I helped them with every problem they brought to me. I still really value their trust.
One important rule I followed always: it was not me who went on to solve the problem, we discussed different possibilities, I would tell them what I would do in their place, and then they were on their own to face their conflict and their life lessons. That was the time when I realized for the first time that the goal of a parent is to help the kids grow up into happy independent adults. To become happy, a person has to learn how to be true to him or herself. To be independent, a person has to acquire many life skills that help him or her to solve conflict situations. If it was me running around and solving their problems they would learn only one thing – to sit at home and wait for the mommy to take care of their business.
Imagine a situation: my daughter didn’t do her homework, but she does not want to get a bad mark. That happened many times when she was in the elementary school. She is asking me what to do. I tell her that she has to come to the teacher before the lesson starts and tell him that the homework was not done because of this and this reason and she promises to complete the work. To do that was not easy for a 6-7-year-old, but she did that, and did that again, and again. It became so easy to her, that later in college it was her second nature to negotiate her work with her professors almost in all classes. Now she is saying she does not remember the first time, it just seems natural to keep them informed about her situation.
This is just one example, but that’s what I call an independent person and that is why I am a proud parent.

Find your passion

Here is another TED idea worth spreading:

Sir Ken is right, of course, but how? How can we help the children to find their passions?
When I think of my own life, what was the hardest thing to do? Finding my passion and recognizing it was the hardest and took the longest. And I am one of the lucky ones who did find it. So, now as a teacher, I believe that the earlier we start bringing the topic of the passion the better chances the kids have.
On the other hand, we do bring the topic early, we always ask the kids what they want to be when they grow up. Some lucky kids just know, like this firefighter, but absolute majority has no idea of what can be their passion. That is why we still have to show them what's there to choose from. This is why the school has to have some basic curricula to help kids in finding their passions. We just have to allow them to choose and quit subjects that obviously are not their passion.
And, again, to some people some struggle is a necessity in becoming.
This is the beauty of the problem. There are as many solutions as there are people.

Being a teacher

Average person in America has an image of a teacher who reads a newspaper in a classroom in front of a class full of students, then collects the papers and grades them at home, isn’t it. How many movies did I see delivering this picture?

In reality we are being watched, all the time, non stop, those students are alive, young and very energetic human beings.

Number one problem is overload. Of course, all working people experience this these days. We all are overwhelmed with responsibilities and assignments we can’t even complete. I am a teacher, I will talk about teachers’ overload. When you come to the point that you are standing in front of the class and don’t remember why you are there, it’s overload. You must do something about that.

Number two problem is complete ignorance and disrespect from the society to your profession and your problems in spite of the fact that everyone is, was, or will be attending a school for 12 years of their lives and then take the kids there too. The job of everyone else is recognized and respected, but teachers and hospitality workers. Not everyone will use a hotel very often though.

Number three problem relates to the fact that the education system involves a LOT of money. No, teachers don’t have high salaries, but there are millions of us. Plus there are millions of students and schools get money for every kid. Every politician, every felon, everyone whose relatives are politicians or felons want a piece of that money. This is why the kids do not get computers, calculators, books, art supplies, and the teachers buy, bring, borrow, steal, or just forget to return stuff we need to use with our students. The money does not get to the classrooms, it’s spent long before it can be even seen here.

We, teachers, know that we can always close the door and just do this thing, called teaching and learning. It is a talent which each of us has.It is different for each teacher as well as it is different for each kid. Some of us are good readers; they inspire reading in their students. Some of us are actors, they will teach the subject matter through role playing. Some of us are artists and they will inspire learning through drawing and sculptures. Unfortunately, fewer see the beauty in Math which is one of the most elegant subjects to my taste. If we are ready for the reform in our education system let’s start with recognition of each teacher’s talent as well as every kid’s gift to learn and then we have to do our best in matching those. Those two have to work together without much homework for either of them because at home they both have many more different things to learn and many more people to meet.

Teaching is ART

I have a Diploma; it’s hanged on the most Southern wall of my house as required by Feng Shui. The Diploma says that I am a Master of Art in Teaching Science. At first I was laughing at it; how can a person be an artist and a scientist at the same time. It took me almost twenty years to understand and really feel it. The job that I am doing IS ART. It requires inspiration and can inspire. I think about how I can make it better all the time. Some ideas can come in my sleep. I deal with people and their emotions all the time. I can affect many lives. Yes, my job is ART.
Many of these conditions are true for science too, but science itself has no emotions, it deals with the world around more than with the people. People are affected only when the scientist discovered and explained something that would trigger the technology to move to the next level. In most cases the science affects all people in the same way. “Good” science brings more useful technology; “bad” science brings more harmful and destructive technologies. This is a traditional view, in reality there is no “good” or “bad” science they both at different stages of their development can bring us useful or destructive technologies, sometimes at the same time. For examples, batteries that are so good for the environment when new and working are extremely poisonous to the landfills when dead.
Art is like people it also is affected by technology not the other way around. Each artist has different effect on different people. One piece of art can turn your life around, the other you’ll pass without even noticing. And, of course, Art causes turmoil of emotions on both sides: the artist who creates it and the viewer who is affected by it. In reality it can be a viewer, a listener, an observer, a reader, a pupil.
I think I do understand it now. I am an artist who works with live human beings, not paint or ink. The result of my inspiration will affect many of my students. Without an inspiration I will not touch them at all. If I allow my sadness, or anger, or hate control my teaching I can affect those young lives in a negative way like nobody else. No parents or friends can affect those lives as I can.
I must be kind and forgiving to teach these qualities by example. I must be understanding and caring to be able to help them grow. I also must treat each of them as an individual, recognize and respect their differences even when the state requires them to pass the same test. Each of them has different needs in order to pass the same test. My art is to find this little something that will help this one student learn what he or she needs to learn and pass this next exam, sometimes without them even noticing what I did for them. And then I have to repeat the process of the search with each next student in each next class.
Of course, there are tricks and strategies that work with more than one student. This is why it is possible to teach how to be an artist. There are rules of perspective and the color wheel. But like any other art teaching can give you this moment of inspiration when you know that you created a masterpiece, when all little parts fell in place, and you affected this person life forever, and he or she will be a happier human being from this moment on. Like I remember I became a happier person when I first saw how the fishes in the Matisse’s aquarium started to move;or when the pink sand on Gauguin’s Hawaiian beach turned alive and vibrant.

Open Cover Letter

To whom it may concern:

I am an ATR (Absent Teacher Reserve) in New York city 2009-2010 school year.

I am looking for a position of a Science or Math teacher at a New York City public middle or high school. I have two NYS and two NYC licenses to teach Chemistry and General Science and Mathematics. My licenses allow me to teach students from 7 to 12 grades.
I am a veteran NYC teacher with 22 years experience working at two South Bronx public schools: one was Martha Neilson School (Bronx site of the Program for Pregnant and Parenting Teens) and the other New Schools for Arts and Sciences. I am out of job for no other reason than closing of my schools by current city administration. I am one of those bad teachers who worked at those bad schools and who deserve to be out on the street without pay according to the city proposed new contract.
Let me tell you how bad I am and how bad were the closed schools.
I was the only science teacher at my school, so I taught all science courses required by the state. I can teach and I was teaching all of the following: Living Environment, Earth Science, Regents Biology, Environmental Science, Chemistry, Physics – all Regents high school courses, in addition Foundation of Science and Physical Science for 8th Graders, Foundations of Math, Math A, Math B. I also taught science and math for special ed. students. After being in my classes the students were passing State Tests, but more importantly they had more positive attitude towards learning and education in general. Many of them were first generation in their families with a high school diploma. I am very proud of each and every one of them.
I am also very proud to be a colleague of so many other bad teachers who worked at my bad schools. They all were and are devoted to the job and the kids. They are my heroes. I love them and I am one of them. We really made a difference in so many lives. We were not just people who delivered some info for the test; we delivered a better life, sometimes in a form of food or clothes, sometimes in a form of shoulder to cry on or an ear to listen. We helped to file job and college applications. We took them to museums and theatres, to parks and to Washington D.C. Yes, our students talked to the congress people and to the senators, to superintendents and judges.
All our students were computer literate. They could, of course, type a paper, but they also could create great Power Point Presentations, Publisher Brochures, Blog online, make glogs, take tests and quizzes online, search Internet, and get around the city blocking (the latter they did on their own). Our students kept their work in virtual portfolios in digital format. The same applies to the teachers: all bad teachers were computer literate, all teachers used either Dell or Apple computers or both for the instructions, and all of us used Smart White Board.
Yes, I am one of these bad teachers from the bad schools that deserved to be closed.
I am looking for a job. I want to continue teaching for another 3 or 4 years. I know I can do a good job teaching for the test because I have nothing against the tests. I know that new schools will be open to replace the closed ones and new young teachers will be as bad as we were. I also know that the city students didn’t suffer too much when I lost my job. I am nobody special, just a bad teacher from a bad school.
I am looking for a job for me. I don’t want to lose my house – I love it. I want the security of a twice a month paycheck so I could do something I love – teach the kids science and math. I want to keep doing the bad job.

Respectfully,

Business Model

I have been very lucky. I have been working in 2 very good schools in the last 22 years. First school, The Program for Pregnant and Parenting Teens, was closed because of the tightening budget in 2007. The other school was closed in June 2009 by Bloomberg-Klein administration.

Why am I saying that the schools were good? It’s because we really served the kids well. The teachers, guidance counselors, social workers, community services, nurseries for the babies, clinic – all of us helped the kids find the way out of difficult situations and become independent and self-reliant human being. In both schools we had great stories to tell. In both schools we had kids who needed help in breaking the cycle and being the first generation in their families to graduate from a High school, move on to a college and achieve a new level of success.

In both cases the schools were closed because the city was trying to save some money. They say they use a “business model” of accountability. They say our numbers were not good: either attendance was low or Regents Tests scores didn’t measure up.

My question is: why would you use the failing “business model” that brought the entire country into an economic recession to schools and replace some more humane model that worked for those kids?

I really don’t understand, why somebody would proudly say that they use this “business model” when everybody knows that the model makes rich richer and poor poorer. Would you use this model if you were poor? Bloomberg became richer when he closed our schools, the city became poorer.

Because of this “business model” the greedy executives, who would make profits even if their clients lose money, got so much that banks do not have any money to lend any longer. Would you use this model if you were not this executive? Bloomberg and Klein are those executives who make those decisions.

I have been lucky, in the last 22 years I made a difference in so many lives for the better future. I hope the kids in the new schools get as much help and understanding from young and new teachers and principals as we were giving to our students in our “bad” schools.