Reading, students, summer

Help Us Create the Best Summer Reading List Ever!

Pernille Ripp
This year has been the year of reading; I don’t think I have ever read so many fantastic books, I don’t think I have ever spent so much money on books, and I couldn’t be happier.  Except now I am faced with a problem; my 5th graders are starting to seriously ponder what they should read over the summer and I running out of ideas.  I have about 30 books to read myself and I have been piling books on their desks but we need a seriously massive list to get us through the summer.  So please help us by filling out any of these boxes on our form.  Pass it around; ask your students, your colleagues  your favorite librarians, and we promise to share all of the results.

Please help us make the best summer reading list ever!

Be the change, reflection

A Child’s Imagination Lost

Pernille Ripp
it’s poetry month and my student shave been sharing these incredible, thoughtful, and often breathtaking poems.  Today, Buddy, a students of mine who is such a writer, left me this on my desk.

Imagination
The thing that kept me occupied
For hours and hours
Was something so valuable
How come I lost it?

The thing that kept me happy
On the days I felt so down
The thing that I used to treasure
Long, long ago

The thing that kept my days
Worth having fun on
The thing that I relied on
For most of my childhood

Why now as I play games and write stories every day
Why aren’t those times fun?
Probably as I grow older
I will lose my treasure; my imagination

As I stood there with his gift in my hand, I knew I had to ask; what do we do in schools to safeguard a child’s imagination?  What do we do to help them keep it?  Or will they see losing their imagination as byproducts of going to school and growing up? 

reflection, students

Teachers Have Feelings Too

Pernille Ripp
He clears his throat, 41 sets of eyes on him.  “My poem has no title…”

It goes something like this….

Wake up, breakfast, school bus
Torture, torture, torture
Recess
Torture, torture, torture
Lunch
Torture, torture, torture
Bus

Snickers, glances at me, back to him, I make a funny joke out of it, but inside I am reeling.

At the end of the day, I pull him aside and I ask what the purpose was to share that poem?  Do I torture him all day?  Is that what I do?  He says no, he was trying to be funnymaybe but has no real explanation and I get tears in my eyes and tell him, “Teachers have feelings too.  And words have power…”

So I leave school feeling like a failure, feeling like I was made a fool just for fun, wondering if he felt  the need to share it with 2 classes to see what my reaction was?  I don’t think I gave him the reaction he wanted, I am pretty sure he wanted anger, but I don’t get angry when students share how they feel, I only reflect.  And yet, the way in which he shared these feelings, whether accurate or just for laughs, haunts me throughout my weekend.

As teachers we are expected to be bulletproof.  We are expected to stand with our shoulders back, willing to take on any criticism anyone may have.  We are expected to take it in stride.  To grow from the words ladled our way.

Yet teachers have feelings too.

We are supposed to continue fighting when seemingly the whole world wants to beat us down for things that are out of our control.

We are supposed to smile through our tears, laugh through our personal pains, and teach, teach, teach no matter what.

Yet teachers have feelings too.

We are expected to make it engaging, interesting, new, and informative.  We are expected to help students grow, become the people we hope they become, and create lasting bonds all while taking whatever words are thrown at us and ducking them.

We tell students that words have power and yet sometimes we wish they didn’t.  We suppress our feelings whenever a parent gets angry, a child fails to understand a concept, and we take full responsibility even when it is not all ours to take.  But sometimes the weight of all those words cracks us just a little.

We try every day to make school a place that children want to come even though some politicians are trying to turn it into a place where students are numbers and we are too.  When we are told how we fail as teachers we are supposed to agree, learn from it, and return to class as if nothing has happened.  But we are human, we take pride in what we do, we invest not just our time but our essence, and so when someone tells me that what I do is torture, it leaves me with the wind knocked out of me, unsure of what to do next.

I am teacher and I have feelings too, even if I try to hide them behind jokes, squared shoulders, mand determined strides.  So do I teach my students that?

reflection

Can Schools Really Stop Bullying?

Pernille Ripp
When I was ten I moved schools because of bullying.  And not your typical every day “You’ll get over it” kind of bullying either, but a viscious concentrated effort to isolate me from my peers and get me into as much trouble as possible.  I was left in a closet.  My best friend was banned from speaking to me at school and children refused to be my partner.  I was the victim nearly every day, often going home in tears, faking illnesses to not have to go to school and begging my mom to please move me.  My bully was not another 5th grader, not the cruelty of a child’s mind, but instead the product of an adult; my bully was my classroom teacher.  A woman that I trusted and l
loved like only a child can adore their teacher, someone who was supposed to protect and guide me as I grew as a learner.  Instead she made it her mission to make me feel like the freak (her words) and bad influence (again her words) that she saw me as.

My mom did the right thing, she contacted the principal.  She held me when I cried.  She spoke to other parents.  She fought for me, but in the end with the Danish school system being so that you have the same classroom teacher from 1st through 9th she knew that this was a losing battle.  So in the middle of 5th grade, I hugged my teacher (yes, really) and said goodbye to all my friends to start a school in a different city.

I speak of my bullying experience as I find myself wondering whether schools can truly prevent and protect children from bullying.  While my case was an extreme one, usually teachers do not bully their own students, it still followed a pattern of hidden targeting and isolation   My teacher was very good at making it look like she didn’t hate me and so when we spoke to the principal he mostly thought we were making it up.  She messed up though when she started contacting other parents telling them to keep their children away from me outside of school.  She messed up when she kept all of the girls in the classroom behind to have them share how much of a bad influence and terrible friend I was.

But most of our students, when they bully, are very good at keeping it secret.  Perpetrators are often those students that know how to manipulate teachers into believing that they would never do such a thing.  Ask any parent and they will tell you that they know that their kid is probably different at school than they are at home.  I know Thea has done stuff at daycare typical of a 4-year-old that I still have a hard time believing she would do.  So we don’t often see the bullying happen and rely on testimony that turns into he said/she said discussions.  We wring our hands, trying to see through the chatter and try to figure out what really happened.  We document, of course, and pass on to the powers that be.  We contact parents and keep a paper trail trying to find patterns, but for what?  Often, if the bullying is bad enough students don’t report it.  Perhaps they fear further retaliation or escalation.  Perhaps they assume that we as a school cannot do much.  Perhaps they don’t think they will be believed.  And so it continues and we can truly do nothing for the unreported.

Yet, if we look at what we can do as a school it is depressingly little; we can scold, we can discuss, we can take away recess.  We can take away privileges, we can threaten and guilt, we can suspend.  We can try to mend relationships and we can try to educate.  But is all of that enough?  Can we truly as a school protect kids from bullies?  Or can we only hope that all of the effort we put into preventing it is enough?

Be the change, reflection, Student-centered

How To Give Your Students a Voice; Advice From Someone Who Tries

Pernille Ripp
image from icanread

I often find myself discussing “Giving students a voice” in the classroom with people who wonder what I exactly mean.  Sure, giving someone a voice sounds great, but how do I know that I am doing that?  What can I do to do that?  What does it look like?  I am not an expert but here is what it looks like to me.

Curriculum; give them ownership.  Even within the strictest of dictated curriculum we can still give ownership to our students, meaning the right to create something that they want to.  If the format is predetermined then give them choice over the topic.  If the topic is predetermined then give them choice in the format.  Presentation, collaboration, and how it will be assessed are also area where you can give students a voice.  You just have to find the time to ask them.
Ask yourself:  Do my students have a say in what they are doing right now?

Classroom Routine.  I don’t make the rules of our classroom  my students and I do.  We discuss them at the beginning of the year and then we modify them as we go.  They have a voice and a right to decide how their classroom will run.  We have non-negotiables such as respecting others and then go from there.  Every year is different because every group is different.
Ask yourself:  Who set the rules of the classroom?

Classroom setup.  This is vital to giving students a voice and often overlooked.  We can dicate our agenda just as easily through our setup as through our words.  Where is your desk located   How is it faced?  Where is the main area of the room?  Where is the focal point?   Can they manipulate the physical classroom?  Can they move desks, tables, areas?  Do they decide where they work?  Do they decide how they work?  All of this gives them a voice.
Ask yourself:  Where do my students work?  What is the vibe of the room?

Assessment.  I do not believe in the power of a report card or in the power of grades.  So students and I discuss what a well-done product should look like.  Students self-reflect a lot and set goals.  They discuss goals with me, with their parents, and with each other.  We strive for accountability and also a deeper understanding of what it means to create.
Ask yourself:  Who determines the grade?  Who establishes the guidelines?
 
An outlet.  Students must know that they have somewhere where they can always turn to speak to each other, to me, to the world.  Our student blogs do that for us and I encourage them to speak freely.  Many of them do and I always grow from what they post.  So find an outlet for their voice so that they know someone is listening.
Ask yourself:  Where do I hear my students voice?  Where does the world?
Face to face.  When my students speak, I listen.  I stop whatever I am doing and I lok at them.  I listen, I respond, and things sometimes are fixed or changed.  We meet as a group every Friday to discuss achievements, share advice, or just check in.  We speak in the morning before the day really gets going so that students know what to expect, know what their day looks like, and what our expectations are.  Students know that I will take the time to listen to them, even if they have complaints, they know I will take it to heart, they know that they can tell me their honest opinion without negative repercussions.   I never hold a grudge and my actions show that.
Ask yourself:  What do I do when students speak to me?  How do I react?
Caring and accountability. When my students speak in their myriad of ways; I listen.  I am held accountable to their words and they often see the direct effect of their words on our classroom, on my teaching, on their daily school lives.  That accountability and caring piece is the most important factor of giving students a voice, fore if we encourage them to speak up then we must also be ready to listen, to change, to act.  Everything else does not matter if they do not believe we actually care about their voice.
Ask yourself:  Which actions show that I care?  What have I changed based on student feedback?