Thought of the Day
Anyone who has ever been a bit of a rebel as a youth seems to know Mark Twain's famous adage "don't ever let school get in the way of your education." From a young age this saying has always conjured images in my mind of Mark Twain's young protagonist, Huckleberry Finn, ditching the civilized life of school to explore the great outdoors while learning invaluable lessons from his good friend and run-away slave, Jim. This to me is American education at its finest - natural, untamed and free. Yet as insightful as this saying may be, I believe its inverse to be even more powerful. For teachers, it is often just as important to make sure that our education doesn't get in the way of school.
Here's what I mean by this. At TFA we are trained to approach teaching in a very focused, achievement-oriented way. This past week we spent hours discussing ways in which to invest our students in what they are learning, manage our classrooms effectively and track student progress in a data-oriented way. The approach, which is often summarized with the phrase "Teaching as Leadership (TAL)," is scientific, interdisciplinary and thorough. I have a tremendous amount of respect for the TAL method and know that there is much to be learned and internalized from what TFA has taught us this past week. I am incredibly fortunate to be receiving this training.
Yet, in a sense, I feel that there is so much more to teaching than the brief training and crash-course in terminology and methods that we are receiving here. This weekend I spent some time exploring the city with some of my fellow soon-to-be teachers (I'm including a few pictures of our adventure below). We took a stroll through Central Park, walked around Rockefeller center and made our way down to The Village where we had some great falafel and shwarma. But by far the coolest part of the trip was when we accidentally bumped into a rag-tag group of musicians at Washington Square - who were out there on a Saturday evening just playing and singing for fun. These guys were absolutely incredible. The impersonations of Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder along with several tap dancing routines left the audience applauding for more.
That got me thinking about my role as a teacher in the lives of my students - about how I wanted to empower my students to grow academically and succeed. But at the same time, I realized that I don't want to get so lost in all the acronyms, toolkits and growth goals that I lose sight of what it truly means to be a teacher. Being in New York, I want my kids to experience the Harlem Renaissance in Harlem. I want them to learn about 9/11 at Ground Zero. And I want them to know that musicians aren't always famous people you see on T.V., sometimes they're normal people that perform for a small group of people in a park. In short, I don't want my training to get in the way of their learning. Rather, I hope to always remember that there is a strong human component to teaching.
Daily Round Up: Highs and Lows
Anyone who has ever been a bit of a rebel as a youth seems to know Mark Twain's famous adage "don't ever let school get in the way of your education." From a young age this saying has always conjured images in my mind of Mark Twain's young protagonist, Huckleberry Finn, ditching the civilized life of school to explore the great outdoors while learning invaluable lessons from his good friend and run-away slave, Jim. This to me is American education at its finest - natural, untamed and free. Yet as insightful as this saying may be, I believe its inverse to be even more powerful. For teachers, it is often just as important to make sure that our education doesn't get in the way of school.
Here's what I mean by this. At TFA we are trained to approach teaching in a very focused, achievement-oriented way. This past week we spent hours discussing ways in which to invest our students in what they are learning, manage our classrooms effectively and track student progress in a data-oriented way. The approach, which is often summarized with the phrase "Teaching as Leadership (TAL)," is scientific, interdisciplinary and thorough. I have a tremendous amount of respect for the TAL method and know that there is much to be learned and internalized from what TFA has taught us this past week. I am incredibly fortunate to be receiving this training.
Yet, in a sense, I feel that there is so much more to teaching than the brief training and crash-course in terminology and methods that we are receiving here. This weekend I spent some time exploring the city with some of my fellow soon-to-be teachers (I'm including a few pictures of our adventure below). We took a stroll through Central Park, walked around Rockefeller center and made our way down to The Village where we had some great falafel and shwarma. But by far the coolest part of the trip was when we accidentally bumped into a rag-tag group of musicians at Washington Square - who were out there on a Saturday evening just playing and singing for fun. These guys were absolutely incredible. The impersonations of Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder along with several tap dancing routines left the audience applauding for more.
That got me thinking about my role as a teacher in the lives of my students - about how I wanted to empower my students to grow academically and succeed. But at the same time, I realized that I don't want to get so lost in all the acronyms, toolkits and growth goals that I lose sight of what it truly means to be a teacher. Being in New York, I want my kids to experience the Harlem Renaissance in Harlem. I want them to learn about 9/11 at Ground Zero. And I want them to know that musicians aren't always famous people you see on T.V., sometimes they're normal people that perform for a small group of people in a park. In short, I don't want my training to get in the way of their learning. Rather, I hope to always remember that there is a strong human component to teaching.
Daily Round Up: Highs and Lows
- High: Setting up my first classroom - Room 414 at M.S. 331 in the Bronx. Doing that was surreal.
- Low: Taking the school bus home from the Bronx to St. Johns. And I thought traffic in Los Angeles was bad.
- High: Exploring NYC. I could live here for years and barely tap into what this city has to offer.
- Low: "The Plans." Investment plans, management plans, procedural plans, etc., I never thought that teachers would have to create so many plans.
- High: 4th of July. Even though we have to work in the morning as the first day of classes is the 5th, I can't wait to celebrate being American.
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| Central Park |
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| Stevie Wonder look-a-like at Washington Square |
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| Restaurants at "The Village" |
I completely agree - as systematic and methodical teaching can be broken down to, your students need more than that, especially with the crazy rich culture in NYC. And furthermore, your students are each completely different and each one will have different needs and have different methods of instruction that work for them. Don't get me wrong, data is pretty much integral to being a successful teacher (how else can you even begin to figure out your students' needs?) but teaching is not just a profession that you can memorize the steps on how to do it and do it - it takes so, so, so much more. And I'm sure you'll be really successful! Hope your first day of teaching (almost over right now??) went well Allen!
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