A VOICE in our Community

During class meeting a few months ago, I asked my thirty 3rd grade students a very open ended question, "What does community mean to you?" Wriggling with excitement, some of them immediately responded by saying "it's where I live" or "my classroom at VOICE charter school."  Others pointed to their parents, policemen and soccer coaches as members of their community. But then Deliah, thoughtful and reflective as always, raised a quiet hand and said, "It's the nursing home my grandma lives in. I go there after school some days to visit her." Pausing for a second, I let that sink in---both for my students and for myself.

Traveling back home on the subway that day, I couldn't help but gravitate back to that moment in class meeting. What Deliah said made me realize that I had yet to fully understand what community really means. The truth is that the word embodies such a complex idea, containing so much meaning. This fall I decided that teaching my students how to become engaged members of their communities was a top priority. Strengthening ties with those in our community can only benefit our student's educational experience. Through this process, I am continually finding new meaning to the word.

We began the year with a strong focus on serving those in need. Our 1st grade students wrote letters to troops overseas and our 2nd grade decorated a local shelter for the holiday season. In December, our 3rd grade class performed some of their Winter Holiday concert program at the Midway Nursing Home in Flushing and our 4th graders caroled at The Center for Rehab in Astoria. We also just organized a school-wide book drive for Hour Children---an organization next door that provides supportive services to incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women and their families.

In December, we began reaching out to parents in our school community with workshops on how to best support their children. We held workshops in Reading, Writing and Math across all grade levels. We also provided our parents with education on healthy snacks. Finally, we just started the VOICE Youth Service Council with the goal of empowering students to be active community contributors. Members of the Youth Service Council are organizing different projects to show their appreciation of various individuals in our school community who often go unnoticed but are important parts of our community. For example, our 3rd graders are creating posters entitled "Getting to know our bus drivers" and creating pamphlets on bus safety to distribute around the school.  

Through these projects our students, despite being no more than seven or eight years old, are exploring what community means to them. They are making a lasting impact in their communities and building relationships with the people they are connected to. Most importantly, through their efforts, our school is becoming a stronger community.

Meet Malasia M.

            Malasia: “Who me?” (loudly, with a puzzled expression on her face).

Me: “Yes you Malasia. The sucking sounds you are making with your teeth are very distracting for the rest of the students and inappropriate for the classroom. Please take a seat in the focus zone until you are ready to be dismissed for snack.”

            Malasia: “Ugh. Why you’se always sending me to that old chair?” (throwing her hands in the air, slowly rolling her way over to the “focus zone” and collapsing into the chair with a huge sigh)

            Me: “Thank you to those of you who are ignoring the distractions that sometimes come into our classroom” (trying hard not to look at Malasia as she begins to lick and gnaw away at the desk with her teeth)

            ----3 minutes go by, the class is dismissed for snack, Malasia joins----

Malasia: “Burp! Mr. Millah, can I drink this soda thingy?” (innocently holding up a 24 oz. bottle of Mountain Dew.

Malasia is one of those students who can infuriate teachers at times with her demanding questions, interesting sounds and uncoordinated movement. Yet at the end of the day I often can’t help but laugh at her personality and expressions. Malasia is probably the biggest girl in the class and can often put on a very tough front. I have a feeling that she may have been a bully in previous grades, but she has become more friendly and kind since entering my 3^rd grade classroom. Overall, she is making progress academically—particularly in Writing. 

            Yet today I want to talk more about the sounds that come out of her—the sounds that children make are perhaps one of the most laughable aspects of the profession of teaching. Malasia, sucks her teeth every mini-lesson, throws her hands up and down making loud smacking sounds every time she wants to answer a question, has a very loud “Huh?” when she doesn’t understand something and has somehow manages to make me (and the rest of the class) acutely aware that she has digestive problems during snack, all the way from across the room. 

           At the same time, Malasia can be incredibly kind and sweet. She often asks me questions in the most gentle and kind way possible—many times just a few minutes after being chastised for something else. She can be very kind to students whom others bully or whom she shares her snack with. Yet the barbaric sounds continue to be a problem. In Room 206, we are working with Malasia to help her control her impulses. We ask her to think before she acts, create a checklist of questions to answer before she says or does anything and have even created simple hand signals to warn her that her volume is getting to high. Improvement is slow, but I am optimistic that with more time and maturity she will be better able to control herself and the sounds that she produces. But for now, we try to find (and even show her) the humor in the noise she makes. 

Parent Teacher Conferences

This Tuesday at VOICE Charter School, we will be having our first set of parent-teacher conferences. When I first found out about the parent teacher conferences, I just assumed that they would somehow jus naturally come together and that this would simply be another minor (informal) time commitment that would supplement the work that I am already doing on a daily basis in the classroom. This notion couldn’t have been further than the truth; there is so much more to parent-teacher conferences than what might at first meet the eye.

The central component to the conferences are the report cards. My co-teacher and I spent several hours this week after school ended working through the 30 report cards we had to complete. This entailed inputting both behavioral and academic grades, filling out performance indicators, adding detailed comments and revising to make sure that our comments were specific, measurable and in-line with the grades we gave. I had to really keep my writing focused to avoid writing too much (although the temptation to just write everything on my mind was ever present.)

Having finished report cards, we then moved on to scheduling the actual conferences. The conferences will all occur on Tuesday from 1-8pm with a two hour break in the middle. Each conference is to last 10 minutes. The tricky part during scheduling was making sure the conferences were convenient for the 12 or so families in our class with siblings in lower grades. This prompted a high volume of emails exchanged between my co-teacher and I and the other teachers in the school, as we all tried to coordinate the meetings to make everything convenient for parents. We were able to resolve most of the conflicts after much work on this and several notes home to parents requesting their flexibility.

The last step was the actual preparation for the meetings. We collected writing samples, exam booklets, behavior notes and created talking points for each conference. Doing so required hours of planning and preparation. My hope is that each parent will have a solid idea of where his or her child stands in comparison with 3^rd grade benchmarks, where they can grow/improve and how the parent can best support their children. Yet, even with all this preparation, I still feel somewhat unprepared. I wonder how parents will respond to these meetings. I’m also interested to see how many parents will show up, what kind of questions they will have and how they will react to constructive feedback of their children. In a few days I will hopefully be able to report back on how these conferences go.

Meet Jorgelys Q.

           Almost everyday, one of my students says or does something that completely catches me off guard. When Jorgelys Q. walked into Room 206 in early September with her goofy grin, round face and slightly playful skip, I knew almost immediately that there would always be something to smile about with her in the class.

            I don’t think I have yet to meet a student so happy and full of joy as Jorgelys. It’s amazing—she is just always happy. It doesn’t matter whether she is taking a Math test, getting chastised by the assistant principal for singing in the bathroom or walking in a silent, single-file line to class. She comes to school everyday with a slightly goofy smile and a joyful sparkle in her eye. 

             

Early this past week, we had a really rough day where the class as a whole was off-task, incessantly chattering, squirming on the rug during mini-lessons and, generally, behaving disrespectfully towards each other and towards the teachers. It got so bad, that at one point in the day I nearly lost it and raised my voice well above where it ought to be to quiet the 30 rambunctious little bodies in the room. It was very clear to the entire class that I was not happy.

 Yet, even in the midst of my stern chastisement, Jorgelys maintained her goofy smile. I think the grin may have even widened a little. Infuriated by her apparent insolence, I demanded that she let me know what she thought was so funny. She simply shrugged her shoulders and grinned at me. “I don’t know Mr. Miller? I’m just so happy and excited. For some reason I’m so happy today—I can’t even control it.” She then wobbled over to her seat and began to hum “Yankee Doodle” in the most nonchalant and innocent way. She was completely unaware that I had just spent 2 minutes asking the class to bring the noise level down to “Level 0.”    

   

In the midst of that heated moment, I couldn’t help but be amused by her innocent and joyful attitude towards life. Here was a little girl who wouldn’t let anything, even the stern, scary teacher bring her down. Learning for her is, and I hope always will be, a joyful, fun process.

Meet Karma M.

I find myself often-telling friends and family members about the more challenging students in my class. These students are continually at the forefront of my mind simply because they require more attention and energy. But today I’d like to talk about one of the students in my class who is perhaps one of the best-behaved students in Room 206. And yet, even so, Karma W. presents we with a different but, nonetheless, challenging problem. Karma does not talk to any adult at VOICE charter school.

The first week of school Karma came in to the classroom a shy little girl. As we went through the attendance that day, every student said, “here” when his or her name was called. When I got to Karma, however, I almost marked her absent because she said nothing. She didn’t even raise her hand that day. It was only because another student spoke for her informing me that she was in fact present that I marked her present that day. Of course, that day I made nothing of it and moved on to the next student.

But over the course of the last month, it has become increasingly clear that there is more than just shyness here. Karma is selectively mute around adults. For the first 2 weeks I never once heard Karma’s voice. She remained respectful and clearly was engaged in the class. Her reading and writing was at grade-level and her math was excellent. But anytime an adult was near her or focused their gaze on her she would close her mouth and refuse to speak. Interestingly enough she grew increasingly talkative with her peers. I even managed to get close enough on occasion to hear her giggling with a friend and chatter with her partner during reading pair-share. Recently I have even been able to communicate via “yes” or “no” head nods or thumb signals.

 I did some research by talking to Karma’s previous teachers. Apparently, she spoke to teachers until she got halfway through 1^st grade. But then she just stopped and has not spoken to adults since then. That is all the information I could really gather to help piece together this mystery, which is far from resolved. I am concerned that Karma’s inability to communicate with teachers will hinder her academic and social progress in the years to come. This week, I’m going to try a new strategy—writing notes back and forth with Karma. I feel like she is starting to build a certain level of comfort in the classroom and I would really like to harness this momentum to slowly start building a relationship with her. We’ll see how she responds this week, but I remain optimistic.