Teaching Honor

Teaching Honor

By Jill Jenkins

            The new Common Core Curriculum includes a list of learning goals that each teacher in four disciplines are required to teach, but it is not the only goals teachers can choose to teach.  When my former school district embarked on implementing the new Common Core, I served on a committee to design an approach for its adoption. The committee decided to adopt a variation of the Gates Foundation Units.  The Gate Foundation has designed six units for each grade level that incorporate the learning goals of the Common Core.  Since I taught ninth grade in a school with four quarter per year, obviously I could not teach each unit per grading period, so I decided to combine two.  The two that I combined during the second quarter was the non-fiction and the honor units.  Furthermore, teaching students to behave ethically seems a huge improvement over only teaching learning skills.  I adapted the following unit for my ninth grade language arts classes. 

            To teach any theme, a teacher needs to incorporate a variety of mediums, and activities.  I included film clips, webpages, articles from magazines, and a novel.  The student had to view film clips, discuss, read fiction and non-fiction, and compose a variety of writing assignments including a research paper and meta-cognition paper. I hoped that when we completed the unit, all of the students would know how to find specific information, synthesize it into a coherent essay on honor using M.L.A. parenthetical footnotes and a work cited page.  One of the problems I had encountered in the past was students did not know the difference from using evidence to support an idea and copying and pasting information they had collected on-line, thus creating a collage of quotes and data.  I hoped also that the students would understand how behaving in an altruistic way benefits everyone.

            I began by having my students view 60 Minutes “Operation Proper Exit” , a story about the sacrifices three, injured soldiers had made. I used this particular film clip because the soldiers are all young, have suffered traumatic injuries trying to rescue other soldiers and their stories are told in an emotional manner making the clip memorable to ninth grade students. During the next class period, I  showed my students a website from John F. Kennedy’s Presidential Library and Museum  that describes John F. Kennedy’s heroic efforts to save his crew when PT 109 sank.  I chose to use this particular website, because the Common Core requires that students study John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address and most of the students have no knowledge of who John F. Kennedy was. On the third class period, I showed this You Tube Video of Captain Richard Phillips  telling his story of his capture by Somali pirates.  The fact that Tom Hanks had recently released a movie about this story increased the students’ interest. A variety of other videos are available including clips from the movie.  The internet is full of human interest stories about people who have behaved in honorable ways.  Any of these stories would work easily as well.  After the student read or viewed each example, I put them into groups of three or four students and asked them to define the term “honor” and identify three specific characteristics that one would have to display to act honorably.  Each group reported back to the class and as a class, the definition and the characteristics were agreed upon through consensus.  I recorded these on the board.  Next, I had them return to their groups and identify the specifically behavior exhibited that made that person honorable.  What did they do?  When each group reported back, I would question them to help them identify specific information.

           

After the students had recorded all of their findings, I gave each student a copy of the a detailed outline breaking the essay into an introductory paragraph with a lead, a definition of honor, three supporting behaviors and a conclusion; three paragraphs in the body where they discussed three separate people and how they behaved honorable, and a concluding paragraph. Using the document camera, I modeled writing the essay while questioning the students how might we best present this idea? One difficulty that many students had was to include any analysis after they presented an example of honorable behavior. To alleviate this problem I pointed out that each paragraph in the body of the paper should include:

• ·         A topic sentence: Who behaved honorably?

• ·         Three characteristics 

• ·         An example of the person’s behavior for each of the three characteristic

• ·         An explanation of why that behavior is honorable

The paper then became a collaborative effort.  After we composed the first two paragraphs, I put the students back into their groups to compose the remaining paragraphs of their rough draft of an essay about honor.

            On the fourth day, I showed the students how to create M.L.A. parenthetical footnotes and works cited page for all of the different kinds of sources we had used over the last few days.  While the students worked on their rough drafts I circulate and help struggling students.  By the end of the period, each student had a rough draft with footnotes and  a works cited page. 

            On the fifth day, they turned in their practice research paper, and we read and watched John F. Kennedy’s Inaugural Address.  I used the speech to talk about honor and to show them how using parallel construction and a combination of longer sentences and shorter sentences can build emotion in a speech or in writing.  Then I showed them the first paragraph of Charles Dickens’ novel, A Tale of Two Cities, to look at the parallel construction.  Finally I showed them my own version of Charles Dickens’ paragraph:

            It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.

            It was the age of Vietnam; it was the age of Haight-Ashbury.

            It was the epoch of sit-ins; it was the epoch of assassinations.

            It was the season of race riots; it was the season of love-ins.

            It was the spring of draft card burnings; it was the winter of Saigon.

            We had Kent State Shootings before us; we had My Lia Massacre before us.

            We were all going directly to Woodstock; we were all going directly to boot-camp.

            In short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of the noisiest             authorities were ousted from some of the highest positions, for some of the most             corrupt actions.

Each student wrote his/her own parody of Charles Dickens' paragraph about his/her own life. They were hilarious.  We spent a class period sharing their creations. I suggested that they use at least one example of parallel construction in their upcoming writing assignment.

            After the first week we were ready to take on the three difficult parts of the unit.  First reading To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee where the class spend a great deal of time discussing how Atticus, Jem, Boo Radley and Calpurnia all behave in ways that could be considered honorable.  How they each made sacrifices to the greater good without concern about what price they might pay. Furthermore, the students were asked to write a research paper about honor. They had to read a biography or autobiography on one person, and research on the other two historical persons were done on the internet or in the library.  The paper included correct M.L.A parenthetical footnotes and a works cited page.  We spend  five days in the library spread out over two weeks, but what they didn't finish in class, had to be completed at home.  They also had to complete a service project and write a one page meta-cognition paper about what they learned from the research paper and participating in a service project. I have attached below the detailed paper I gave my students and the rubric that I used to grade them. 

            This is an abridged version of all of the small steps I took to complete the unit, but it gives you an idea of many of the highlights.   (A tops report is a report from Accelerated Reading, a computerized program my school used where students would read books and instead of writing a book report, they took a 10-20 question quiz on the book.)

            The unit can synthesize many of the learning goals of the common core, but it also teaches values.  I used to think that value education was inappropriate because whose values should we represent;however,  in today's world, I think teaching ethics is the most important issue we teach in schools.  I had one reluctant learner who had not completed his project.  I had told them that serving others could be serving your family or neighbors.  I gave my students the example that as a single parent after a long day of teaching, I was delighted to discover that my daughter had cleaned our cottage and prepared dinner.  To prevent a failing grade in Language Arts, this six foot four inch line-backer baked cookies for each of the people in his elderly neighborhoods and delivered baskets of cookies to them.  His mother thanked me for forcing him to complete the project.  She said he finally learned that being a neighbor means giving back, not just taking.  That is what we want our students to learn.  

Research Paper and Term Project

·       Requirements:

o  Title page:  Title, Name, Period, Date, and Illustration

o  Three to five page body with six to nine parenthetical footnotes using the MLA method of documentations

o  Work Cited Page

o  Tops Report or Book Report if no AR test is available from a Biography or Autobiography on a person who behaved with honor

·       Prompt:  What is honorable behavior?  Define honor and identify three characteristics that a person would have to exhibit to consider his/her behavior as honorable.  Find three historical persons who have behaved ethical.  Using warrants identify what specific behavior that person did and explain how that makes the person honorable.  Make sure you support each of the three characteristics with specific behaviors and analysis of the behavior.  Include three paragraphs that refute how others might believe that the three people did not behave honorable. 

·       Read a biography or autobiography on one of the people that you have selected and take an AR test or a Book Report if no AR test is available. Write a three to five page research paper with nine to twelve parenthetical footnotes using the MLA method of documentation.

·       Your sources should include the biography that you have read, other books, inter-net sources, but all must be reliable.  Note Wikipedia and Blogs will not be acceptable as they are not reliable.  Yahoo and Google are search engines, not sources.  Using them is like saying…”I found it in the library.”  This applies to everyone, even those who consider themselves cute and charming.

·       Due Dates:

o  Research cards: (nine sources and nine quotes)________________/180

o  Outline _______________________/100

o  Rough Draft/Peer Editing _____________________________/100

o  Final Copy ___________________________600

o  Tops Report ________________________100

Title Page			10
Footnotes			60
Introduction:
	Lead		5
	Definition		5
	Three Characteristics		15
	Thesis Statement		5
Character One	Three Characteristics		15
	Supporting Examples		30
	Analysis of Examples		30
	Refutation		5
Character Two	Three Characteristics		15
	Supporting Examples		30
	Analysis of Examples		30
	Refutation		5
Character Three	Three Characteristics		15
	Supporting Examples		30
	Analysis of Examples		30
	Refutation		5
Conclusion			10
Organization	Transition Words and organized information		10
Voice	No 1st of 2nd person		10
Word Choice	Formal language		10
Sentence Fluency	No Run-On , No Fragments, A Variety of  Sentence Length, A variety of sentence structures		10
Convention	Grammar, punctuation, usage, capitalization		10
Works Cited Page	With 9-12 entries using MLA		100
Format	Double Spaced 12 point  Times Roman font 1” margins		100
Tops Report			100
Total			700

Term Project

.  Participate in a service project.  Find a project to complete in our community.  You may go with a partner or group of students, but you must have a parent or adult go with you.  Write a one-page paper describing what you did, and reflect on what you have learned from the experience.  Finally, have either a parent or the organization sign it to verify your work.  (100 points)

·          Help serve meals to the homeless at St. Vincent de Paul Center (363-7710, ext. 1418), or at any other homeless shelter in our community.

·         Donate time to a religious organization providing food or assistance to the homeless or hungry.

·         Organize a food drive in your neighborhood and deliver the items to the Utah Food Bank.

·         Have a yard sale with others in your neighborhood.  Donate the proceeds and unsold items to your favorite charity.

·         Sort food and build orders at the Utah Food Bank (978-2452).

·         Help offset elderly residents’ utility bills through Lend-A-Hand/Rocky Mountain Power Utility Assistance Program (800-328-9272).

·         Knit warm hats and scarves for low-income and homeless families at Crossroads Urban Center (359-8837).

·         Provide and prepare evening meals for families at the Ronald McDonald House; contact Beth (363-4663).

·         Write stories to help adults learn to read and write; Literacy Action Center (326-8101).

·         Help senior citizens and people with disabilities with yard work, raking, etc.

·         Visit www.nothingbutnets.net and organize a campaign among your family members to assist other families in Africa.

·         Visit www.informationandreferral.org and find out about service opportunities in your area.

·         If you have an idea of your own, please speak with your Language Arts Teacher

Name:  ___________________________________________________________________  Period:  __________

Acting Honorably

Purpose (25 points)	1.  Does your project help people who are currently experiencing the effects of poverty (lack of food, clothing, or shelter)? 2.  Does your project help people improve their life skills, or alleviate current hardships they may be experiencing? 3.  Is the purpose of your project something other than” just trying complete something easy for this assignment?"
Organization (25 points)	1.  Does your project require you to organize and/or coordinate the project? 2.  Does your project require you to contact a community organization to arrange how and when you could be of assistance to the poor or needy? 3.  Does your project require that you do something more than simply "show up" to work?
Commitment (25 points)	1.  Have you completed a minimum of five hours of actual assistance to others? 2.  Have you completed the time sheet thoroughly? 3.  Does your time sheet have the appropriate information and signatures?
Summary (25 points)	1.  Does your summary clearly explain the purpose, organization, and commitment required to complete your project? 2.  Does your summary explain what you learned? 3.  Does your summary provide a brief comparison between the purpose of your project and how it may differ from the circumstances of your life?

Name:  _________________________________________________________________  Period:  ____________

           

A Warm and Inviting School Climate

A Warm and Inviting School Climate

By Jill Jenkins

            Creating a positive school climate is complex because it involves keeping teachers and staff happy, keeping parents and guardians happy and keeping students both happy and challenged.  The administrators have to juggle all of the groups and maintain fair and reasonable rules of procedure all while appearing to be the as happy and inviting as a used-car salesman.  This is not an easy task. Civility is the first order of business.  Teachers have to model civility to students and parents and administrators need to treat everyone with civility.  The only way students learn good manners and civility is to be treated that way. Equity is the second key to keeping everyone happy.  Procedures and rules need to be administrated consistently.  Finally recognizing quality performance in students, faculty and staff is key to keeping everyone happy.

            Most parents want their child to have every opportunity and to be treated fairly.  They want their child to be held accountable, but not treated too severely. They want their child to perform well academically, but to not be overwhelmed.  These are the good parents who want to be kept abreast of upcoming assignments, skills their child needs help with and get an occasional pat on the back for being a good parent, but they aren’t the only parents you will encounter as a teacher or a principal. When administrators enforce rules consistently, parents and students usually accept the consequences, but if there is even one breach in modus operandi, some parents will begin fishing for that loop hole.

             For example, one set of parents who did just that kind fishing did not want their son sent to in-school suspension regardless of the number of classes in which he was tardy.  It didn’t matter to them what the school policy was; tardiness didn’t matter. One vice principal beaten down by their endless assaults relented  and everyone suffered.  When their son, Bob, was found by the school police officer at the nearby 7-11 when he was assigned to be in my Language Arts class, they were mortified to learn from the vice principal that the school policy required that he serve one day suspension for his Ferris Buehler one period holiday, and that he would not be allowed to make up any tests or assignments he missed during that class period, they assured the vice principal that it was the school officer’s fault that he was absent.  Their son had called his mother from 7-11 and told her that he was only there to pick up a snack before returning to my class to take his test.  Therefore, it was the school officer’s fault that he missed the class.  He would have only been late, but instead he was sent to the vice principal’s office, so it wasn’t his fault.

              When the vice principal, would not accept her explanation, Bob’s mother called me.  It was just as I was leaving school, and I stupidly picked up the telephone.  Bob’s mother began her harangue for about thirty minutes and whenever I tried to intervene, she would ask me to stop interrupting her.  Finally, I was desperate, because I had already spent almost ten hours at school and I had to pick up my husband (teachers have lives too), but she hadn’t let up. It occurred to me that her technique for getting her son excused from in-school suspensions was to simply become so difficult that it was easier to give in to her.  This woman was a bully, but she had just met the immovable force.  Yes, I could have saved time and just let her son take the test.  It probably would have no bearing on his grade since he rarely paid attention or studied, but if Anne Sullivan had given in to Helen Keller and take the easy road as her parents had, Anne would never had become the person she became, so I decided to hold strong and I hoped the principal would back me.  I said, “I’m sorry that you don’t agree with the policy, but I’m only a teacher.  My job is to enforce the policy.  If you want the policy changed, you will have to talk to the principal.  Good bye.”  I hung up the phone and left.

              The next morning the principal thanked me because the mother immediately called her and told her I had hung up on her, but I said goodbye first.  The principal had to stay an extra hour to pacify this parent that had gone from a little heated to irate, even livid.  The principal had not given into her, but she had spent a considerable amount of time placating this parent.  She said the trick was to let parents vent.  Another principal tells me that the trick is to let the calls go to voice mail, listen to their angry tirade, collect all the facts and call them back. Still another principal tells me the trick is to let it go to voice mail, listen to their angry tirade, collect all the facts and call them back when you know they aren’t going to be there and leave a voice message. (If only I had known these tricks before I picked up that phone.)  Regardless of the method a principal chooses to use to deal with difficult parents, please deal with them. As a teacher when you deal with a difficult parent, collect all the facts and give them to the administrators so they aren’t blindsided by an irritated parent with a phone. Parents like this are especially difficult when they appear in your room unannounced just as first period is beginning and your class is looking hopelessly as they parade past the parent's tirade or when they appear at your door while you are teaching and try to wave you into the hallway.   Administrators need to take a firm stand with parents that they are not allowed to interrupt a teacher during class time.

            Keeping the faculty and staff happy is easy.  First, feed them at meetings.  Second, stick to an agenda, keep meetings short and to the point; don’t waste their time.  Third, treat all of the faculty members the same.  If a teacher isn’t doing his/her job, missing meetings, or isn’t working as a team player, don’t hesitate to call him/her in and tell him/her.  If a teacher is doing a great job, don’t hesitate to call him/her in and tell him/her. Fourth, keep organized and communicate all upcoming events to teachers and staff.  No one wants to be surprised with last minute a schedule change.  Everyone is the school is planning lessons and activities, so it is important to give them enough time that if they need to change their classroom schedule, they can.  Fifth and most importantly, handle the difficult parents and students.  No matter how skilled your teaching staff is there are going to be unreasonable parents and destructive students.  Make sure your staff knows that “you’ve got their back.” This also means that when a principal uses a short cut to relieve himself of a teacher he perceives as incompetent, the rest of the faculty becomes very insecure, even when he may be justified.  In most school, there is a long procedure for relieving a school of an incompetent teacher.  Some principals will merely transfer those teachers from one school to another when they become overstaffed. This means they are sharing their grief with another school, not solving the problem. Regardless of how long and cumbersome the process is, the principal should follow it.  When a faculty learns that a principal is placing notes in a teacher’s mail box suggesting they transfer to another school that has an opening or when a principal reduces an experienced teacher’s schedule to part-time while keeping less experienced teacher full time, he is sending a message to his entire faculty that “you could be next.”  Instead of sharpening teacher’s game, it builds mistrust. All teachers need to be treated fairly even if the procedure is time-consuming. Procedures are designed to protect teachers from unfair prejudice of an administrator while still identifying incompetent teachers.  By following those procedures, the faculty feels that treating everyone fairly is a priority of the principal.  Sixth, listen to your teachers. One principal create a board of directors who met with him for lunch once a month.  He was able to keep abreast of the teachers’ frustrations and problems. This allowed him to solve problems and it made the faculty feel like they had a voice.

            Keeping the students happy is not that difficult.  First, most students get bored in school because many classes are not interactive enough.  Look at this research down by a veteran teacher who shadowed two students for a day: “Granted and thoughts on education” by Grant Wiggins.  Encourage your teachers through workshops to make their teaching more interactive.  Second, most students like to hear when they have done something well.  In the 1990’s I presented my principal with the idea of giving students cards when we caught them doing something well.  The program is still in effect today, but it has improved.  When the students receives what we originally called PAWS pass, they take to the office and receive a piece of candy and the put their card with their name on it into a drawing.  At the end of the week, several tickets are selected for larger prizes.  The teacher who gave out the most Paws Passes gets a prize too (usually a $5.00 gift card to a local café.)  Another way, to give students recognition is to encourage them to participate in contests:  PTA Reflections, writing contests, arts contest, school contests like Chalk the Walk and athletic teams. When a team or an individual wins announce it.  Hang the pictures of students in the hall.  For example to encourage reading, I used to take my camera and wander Reading and Language Arts classes to snap pictures of students reading during their Silent Sustained Reading time (S.S.R.), or their Drop Everything and Read Time (D.EA.R.).  We hung these in the hallway.  Everyone likes to feel like a winner.

            Keeping a positive school climate is not easy and it is not accomplished in one step.  It really takes buy-in from your faculty and staff.  Administrators need to go the extra mile to recognize the teachers and students who make a difference.  When everyone works together to make the school a more pleasant place to work, everyone wins. Start by greeting your staff and faculty as they arrive in the morning.  Persuade your staff to stand in the hall and greet their students as they come into class.  Remember encourage them to think positively about their students. Start a campaign to say something positive to each student as they enter a classroom. Send positive postcards home to students. Treat everyone with respect and dignity.  Positive attitudes of administrators and staff can become contagious.  Invite parents to serve on committees, participate in activities, and in the classroom.  The more they feel involved the more they support the school.  Support the teachers for the few parents and students who don’t catch the bug.  Spread good will.