Why I Changed My Mind About Accelerated Reader

              Teachers evolve.  They are not, despite what we may want to believe, born or created with all the essential teacher knowledge and skills they will require over the course of a career.  Because they evolve, teachers should be able to reserve the right to refine ideas and strategies and to abandon old practices in favour of new ones.  In short, as a teacher, I want to be able to change my mind based on my own learning.

               Let me give you an example, an example with which I think many schools and administrators and teachers struggle.  Accelerated Reader.  The notion behind Accelerated Reader is simple: students read a book at their “reading level,” and write a short (usually 10 question) multiple choice test once they have finished the text.  Based on their score, and assuming they pass, students are assigned “points.”  Students generally have a term goal for the number of points they must achieve.  The program is predicated on the idea that students need to read in order to improve their reading.  It also “ensures” students read by “testing” them at the completion of the reading.  I use those words in quotation marks because, as many of us who have used the program are aware, it is fairly easy to cheat the tests.  But I digress.

               Ten years ago, I was at a school that instituted the use of Accelerated Reader.  Immediately, we saw several benefits to the program.  First, library circulation increased dramatically.  The entire language arts department rejoiced.  Students were taking books out of the library!  This was very exciting.  Secondly, students were reading independently all the time!  This was a marked change from previous behaviour.  Lastly, our reading program was garnering support from parents and administration!  This could not be more thrilling.

               Over time, however, I started to notice a few downfalls to the program.  Students were taking books out of the library, it is true, but many of them were low-level books that did not generate any discussion.  How many Babysitter Club books does a ninth grade student usually read?  Probably not many, but with AR, many students were reading for quantity rather than quality.  Also, as mentioned before, students were cheating the system – taking, and passing tests based on films previously viewed or books only partially read.  The increase in readership was not improving the quality of writing about books or discussion in class.  The problem, though, was that we had become so heavily financially invested in the program we didn’t feel we could stop.

               Not long after this, I took a position at another school that did not have AR.  My teaching partner and I still had a goal of encouraging independent reading, but we did not have a program to do it for us.  So, we researched.  We talked to consultants.  We did a lot of experimenting in our classrooms.  What we determined isn’t particularly surprising to me now, but it was earth-shattering to me then.  WE needed to read, too.  We read a lot of books and then talked about them with students.  We started keeping a list of recommended books posted in the library and classrooms, and readership of those books increased.  We instituted a “book club” in class during which groups of students could choose the novels they read and they would talk about them in weekly meetings.  We learned strategies to teach the students close reading and linked classroom texts to independent reads.  We talked about reading and we modeled reading and we shared reading and we wrote about reading.  The result?  We created a school culture of reading that was independent of an expensive “reading program” – and a culture that resulted in excellent scores on provincial exams.  Even more importantly than exam results, however, was the quality of reading and discussion happening on a consistent basis.

               I don’t blame myself for being a proponent of AR at the time.  I was a beginning teacher.  I knew I wanted the students to read and didn’t know enough about how to go about it.  I wanted what many of us want: the silver bullet program that will take care of all my students’ issues for me.  Over time, what I have come to realize is that when I start looking at a “program” to take care of my students’ needs, it is usually a lack in my own knowledge about the best ways to teach them.  Once I take care of my own learning gaps, my students’ achievement improves.

               Here is the really tough part, and the part I need to address to the people who purchase these programs – usually with the best of intentions.

Dear administrator: 

               I know you may be frustrated.  You probably feel you have invested too much money in AR for it to be abandoned.  I would suggest, however, that we abandon expensive things all of the time in the name of progress.  Despite the significant cost of the Apple IIe, I don’t see any of them in schools.  They simply do not meet our needs any longer.  Neither, I would suggest, will Accelerated Reader.  Abandon it, and invest instead in the professional development of your English teachers.  Help your teachers evolve as instructional leaders, and you will not need quick-fix programs. 

               What’s that?  You need the data AR provides for you?  Well, first of all, AR’s test results are shoddy at best, since the questions are largely low-level recall questions.  There will be no alignment with results on state or provincial reading exams.  Secondly, the best data is substantiated with in-class qualitative data.  This can be done without AR.  Give up on the fancy printouts and find another way around it.  You can do it.  Maybe you just need some additional professional development?

               We should measure cost in a lot of ways, not all of them financial.  Accelerated Reader comes at a cost to our students’ reading lives as Accelerated Reader does not create a life-long reader and lover of literature.  There is a cost to our professional integrity when we hold on to programs we know are not beneficial.  As a result of these costs, there is a huge cost to English teachers’ sense of quality and worth.

               Let’s change our minds.  With a strong rationale and teacher created program in place, student learning will improve, achievement will accelerate, and reading will become a life-long love affair.

You Can Call Me Mom (Or, On Taking Academic Risks)

A student called me “Mom” the other day.

It isn’t that calling a teacher “Mom” (or “Dad”) is that unusual.  Lots of kids forget and make that mistake.  It’s that he made a mistake once, thought about it for a minute, and then said it again.  Awesome.  (This is a good place to note that I am, in fact, old enough to be his mother.  If I wasn’t, this post would have started much differently.) We had a good chuckle about it and then moved on to our literary analysis of our novel study.   He posed a great question and made a particularly salient point.  He’s a positive, contributing member of the class, and consistently tries hard.

Later, though, it made me think.  What makes students comfortable enough to take academic risks?  To ask questions, to participate, to be creative, to stretch beyond what is merely acceptable?

First, let’s start with what DOESN’T encourage academic risk-taking:  multiple-choice, knowledge-based tests.  As long as we focus only on the right answers, students will not take a chance in their learning. After all, what if they are wrong? 

Instead, we need to focus on critical thinking skills.  Right/wrong answers do not encourage deep thinking or analysis.  Right/wrong answers do not leave room for ambiguity, for wrestling with big ideas, or for creatively applying inventive thinking.

I’m going to admit something pretty embarassing.  I used to be guilty of this bifurcated thinking.  Back when I was a new English teacher, I was hyper-focused on getting students to prove they had read the text we were studying.  And because I was teaching so many students, I wanted them to prove it as expediently as possible (usually with some kind of multiple choice, matching, true/false kind of test).  In addition to ensuring they had read the text, I was super vigilant about ensuring they knew all the “content” of English study – rote vocabulary memorization, definitions of literary devices and figures of speech, grammar rules and the like.  What I started to find, however, was that students looked to me as the expert in the room, the one who held all the answers.

I don’t want to be the one who holds all the answers.

My classroom looks a little different now.  We talk about the author’s intent.  We look for proof – together.  I ask students what they think and wait until they respond.  They know better than to expect I will give them the answer.  Somehow, the classroom culture has shifted.  How did that happen?

First, I don’t give those kinds of tests anymore.  As a matter of fact, it is a long time before I give a “test,” and even when I do, it sure doesn’t look like one many of them have ever seen.  They write a lot and I give a lot of feedback.  I’ve determined, over time, that the many many hours I spent correcting each comma splice were largely useless.  Now, I make a couple of comments and conference while kids are reading or discussing in small groups.  Pointing out the error in person is a lot easier, faster, and more effective than bleeding red pen all over the page.

Secondly, I structure activities a whole lot differently.  I model.  Then I model some more.  We have whole class discussions and small group discussions and they write and we talk and then they write some more.

I’m not going to lie.  There are some students who are frustrated.  They have a good time, but then at the end of the day, they still want to know if they are “right.”  These few students like tests that assess discrete bits of knowledge because they have learned to play the “school game,” and are good at those kinds of evaluations.  They sometimes find my assessments frustrating.  But you know what?  I’m ok with that.  Usually, they can admit they are learning, even as they bemoan the fact that English is “hard.”

What I found, though, is that with the shift in approach – away from drill and kill – there was also a shift in relationship.  Now that I am helping them refine their own understanding rather than telling students what to think about the literature, students are more relaxed.  We laugh more.  We share more books and read more poems.  They come to me with texts they have found and say, “this reminds me of what we were talking about.” 

That’s why I’m so very good with the fact that my student called me “Mom.”  If he is as comfortable in my class as he is at home, then he is able to take “academic risks” in order to learn.  And if he can do that, then I will have done my job.  I’m a proud “mom.”

Confessions of an English Teacher

I’m teaching a whole-class novel.

I know, I know.  Student choice is critical in engaging them in reading.  Students should be allowed to direct their own reading in order to increase their engagement.  They should talk about their reading in small groups so everyone gets a chance to speak.  I am the first person to champion individual and small group reading and used to be the first to decry the whole-class novel.

Let me explain:

Back in the day, I taught the whole-class novel.  We read A Wrinkle in Time in grade seven, The Giver in grade eight (or maybe The Outsiders), and The Pigman in grade nine.  My colleagues and I handed out the package of worksheets with chapter questions and vocabulary.  We diligently marched through the novels, often in lock-step harmony.  The students, equally diligently, looked up words in the dictionary and wrote sentences using those words; they completed figure of speech worksheets by copying quotations from the book.  At the end of the novel, they re-imagined the ending or wrote a sequel chapter.  Let’s be honest.  I was bored.  And if I was bored, I can only imagine how my students felt.  As I began reflecting on this process, I also noticed that no one was reading books outside of our novels studies.  If I wanted my students to love reading as much as I did, I needed to change things up.

As we all do when we want to make a change, I swung the pendulum in the complete opposite direction.  I started talking about what I was reading and I was “book-talking” all the time.  My students read self-selected books and kept journals.  They read in book-club groups and talked about their reading with small groups.  They did individual and group projects.  It was absolutely awesome.  I worked with my colleagues and, before long, we had a true culture of reading in our school.  Without a qualm, I dropped the whole-class novel like a hot potato. 

After a few years of this, though, I started thinking about the whole-class novel again.  I wasn’t doing a whole lot of instruction about HOW to read a novel.  I taught how to read a short story and how to read a poem and how to read a play – but not all reading is the same.  Also, some kids were consistently choosing fun books (which is wonderful) but they weren’t being challenged in their reading.  They weren’t reading the novel as closely as I might have liked.  They were reading the way I read beach reads – find out what happens and discard the book without a second thought.  Here’s what I wondered, though: How do I get kids to take their time with the novel if I don’t show them?  How can I get them to read the novel carefully and thoughtfully?

I started thinking about resurrecting the idea of the whole-class novel, but with a few key differences.  First, I would no longer rely on the books in the dusty bookroom.  I would use current and relevant and popular young adult literature and ask students to pay for the books.  This way, I wouldn’t be married to the novel for all eternity; kids would have the opportunity to make notes in the novel and read something pertinent to them.  We wouldn't abandon our small group and independent reading; we would just add the novel study to all the great things we were currently doing in the class.  Kids still had voice and choice - just not all the time.  The biggest difference? No worksheets. 

So now when we read the novel, here’s how class looks: We read.  We make notes in the margins.  We flip back to where we annotated the text with question marks.  We laugh at funny parts together and we share the emotional parts of the text together.  Because we have a strong culture of reading already, it is no problem to get them to trust me that this is a good book.  The trick is to get them to be patient with it.  This is a different kind of reading and we are reading for a different purpose.

A few things help.  First, I picked great books.  Last year, we read The Hunger Games.  I don’t think there is a book with bigger buzz than that one in the last couple of years.  This year, we are reading Please Ignore Vera Dietz.  Just out of luck, I saw a tweet in which A.S. King said she Skyped with a class, so I contacted her to see if she’d visit with my class too.  Fortunately, she said she would and our visit is coming up.  I can’t even tell you how excited my students are.  They have so many questions and they are so much more willing to really examine the author’s craft because they know they are going to be talking to her at the end of the month.  We are keeping a list of important quotations and making notes about characters and key themes as we progress.

         Here’s how I know it is working.  Since we’ve started I’ve heard, “Can we have a triple class today?”; “We are creating our own vocabulary list – for fun.”; “I never realized how much planning goes into a novel before.  I can tell because she gave us a hint and we put a question mark in the margin, and thirty pages later, I got the answer.  She had to have planned that out.”; “Awwww.  Class is over?”;  And my favorite: “I’d like to write like that one day.  Do you think I could?”

         Lightbulbs are going on all over the place.  The whole-class novel is not a bad thing.  It is all in the approach.  English Language Arts is fun and we are learning at the same time.  I can’t ask for more.

Gifts beyond Measure

              I know teachers who, every year, count up the numbers of gifts they receive from students.  I even know teachers who drop “hints” about their favorite coffee or other things they might “like” for Christmas.  Then, there is the inevitable comparison in the staffroom as people compare the quality of their gifts.  I know administrators, too, who fall prey to this trap of NEEDING to be appreciated, who count cards from staff like one might count money in the bank – measuring self-worth by the cost of token gifts.

               This Christmas, I’d like to focus on the gifts my staff and students have given me that have nothing to do with wrapping paper or money.  Here are just five things for which I am grateful this year:

               #1:  The gift of risk-taking:  I know I ask staff and students to do things that are beyond their comfort zone.  I ask them to stretch their learning, to try new things, to change established routines and behaviours.  That isn’t easy.  I’m sure thankful to those people who stand up and say, “YES!  I will try that!  Let’s give it a whirl!”

               #2:  The gift of critical friends:  No one has all the answers.  I know that I need people I like and trust to help me out when I am going off the rails (so to speak).  My critical friends help me through many difficult issues, but they also help me become a better teacher.  They ask WHY, and force me to articulate an answer.  In so doing, I have to be darn sure I have an excellent rationale for why I do what I do.  And sometimes, I don’t have an excellent rationale.  My critical friends help me go back to the drawing board.

               #3:  The gift of patience:  Patience is not a virtue with which I was born.  I’ve had to work at it.  Every time I work with a student or teacher who is maybe a bit more difficult than the average bear, I have to remind myself they have a reason for their behaviour, that it likely isn’t me, but that I am in a position to help smooth the way so we can get back to the issue at hand.  I’m grateful for those who have helped me see the value of patience.

               #4:  The gift of laughter:  My life would not be nearly so fulfilled if I didn’t receive the gift of laughter from my students and co-workers on a daily basis.  The people with whom I work are witty, joyful people.  The students I teach are funny, happy kids.  This is one of the greatest delights of my life: I am able to spend much of my work time laughing with friends and students.  Teaching and learning become that much more enjoyable when we can laugh together.

               #5:  The gift of inspiration:  It is so inspiring to see co-workers who experience success with a student with whom I’ve struggled.  There is little more inspiring than seeing a kid say, "I can do this!" when, really, there is no reason why they should be able to achieve it.  There is nothing more inspiring than seeing parents who have overcome all odds (immigration, addiction, poverty) caring profoundly about and working diligently for their child’s education.  I am grateful to have the opportunity to work in a place where I get to see the resilience and goodness of the human spirit on a daily basis.

               Today, I received a beautiful note from a student.  That little handwritten note means more to me than anything she could have bought me.  Her gift is precious to me, because I know it comes from the heart.  My cup runneth over. 

Why I'm Proud My Kid is a Nerdfighter

             According to Urban Dictionary, the most popular definition of a Nerdfighter is “people who, instead of being made up of cells and organs and stuff, are actually made out of awesome.  They fight decepticons on behalf of Nerds everywhere!”  Nerdfighters have their own lexicon, much of which I don’t understand, but even I can figure out that the primary focus of a nerdfighter is to “decrease world suck” and increase “world awesome.” 

               I’m not sure what it was, exactly, that caused my fantastic and fabulous daughter, Anna, to become interested in Nerdfighteria.  I met John Green at an ALAN conference once and brought her home a signed copy of one of his novels.  I showed her a couple of videos he & Hank made I thought were interesting.  But, to be honest, that can’t completely be it.  My influence didn’t make her a Nerdfighter.  Elements within novels, within the vlog posts, and within the Nerdfighteria community captured her imagination.  Something spoke to her, something that connected with her so deeply, she began to internalize that persona of “nerdfighter” as her identity.  I just have to say - I am so totally ok with that.

               Here’s the deal:  I teach other 15 year olds and I see the myriad of influences – positive and negative – that press upon a kid’s psyche.  Kids have to sift through a lot of information and social pressure in order to decide who they are now and who they want to be in the future.  I sure don’t need to tell you not all of it is good.

               Anna could be doing a lot of things.  She could be hanging out with sketchy people doing questionable things.  Instead, she hangs out with positive people doing remarkable things. She reads (a lot!).  She writes (she completed a Nanowrimo novel!).  She makes videos (check out threelimesandalemon on youtube!).  She expresses herself imaginatively.  She works with others to create something more than what was there before – something awesome and something uniquely hers.    Unlike many kids her age, she thinks about others complexly.  She imagines the world as a better place and works towards that lofty goal.  In other words, she embraces and embodies the Nerdfighter identity.  As her mother, I couldn’t be prouder.

               This weekend, Anna joined the YouTube and Nerdfighter communities and made a Project For Awesome video with a friend.  Check out their video and consider supporting their causes:  http://dft.ba/-1eVH

Life Lessons from Junior High

              On the wall in our school library, a question is painted on the wall.  It asks, “How will you change the world today?”  As the Assistant Principal of our junior high, I think about this question often.  It is a constant reminder that small actions can lead to real and important change; it reminds us that every person is capable of leading others to greatness.  One of the ways in which we can do that is to demonstrate real and meaningful kindness to others.  Some teachers seem to feel that kindness may show some sort of weakness; however, it actually takes a teacher of significant inner strength and conviction to consistently demonstrate kindness to students – even students who may not deserve it.

                One of those people is a guy in my class.  We’ll call him “Martin.”  (Names have been changed to protect the innocent – and the not-so-innocent.)  Now, Martin is the kind of guy teachers simultaneously love and despise.  He is smart, but never tries very hard.  He is athletic, but doesn’t pay attention to the coaches.  He is a good-looking guy, but sometimes thinks too highly of his appearance.  In short, Martin is the most frustrating kind of kid to teach because he just doesn’t listen to anyone – not teachers, not parents, not friends.  To be honest, it can get kind of annoying.

                But here is the deal.  This kid – the one that everyone finds so irritating because he doesn’t listen – doesn’t seem to have any issues in one teacher’s class.  That teacher finds him funny.  No.  Not just funny.  That teacher finds Martin hilarious.  He never has anything bad to say about Martin, just that he finds Martin endearing.  He likes him.  And what is interesting is that Martin seems to genuinely like him as well.

                For the twelve days before Christmas, I asked random students to write notes to staff members to say why the students think those staff members are awesome.  I thought it would be a nice gesture at a time of year during which many people are stressed and ready for a holiday.  When I asked Martin to write a note, he knew just to whom he would write.  Interestingly, he also knew to whom he DIDN’T want to write.  The difference between those two staff members?  Martin perceived that one treated him kindly and one did not.  Martin behaved for one and for one he did not.  It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that maybe Martin responds better to kindness.  Martin didn’t necessarily deserve the kindness because he was kind first, but I don’t think that is the point of being kind.

I’m not going to lie; Martin is a frustrating kid.  I sure admire the strength it takes for our staff member to see past the irritating behavior and see the person of worth beneath it all.  Maybe the fact that one teacher treated Martin kindly isn’t going to change the world.  But, it sure makes things a bit easier at school.  And isn’t that the point?  Kindness just makes everything a little bit nicer, a little bit easier, and a lot more pleasant.  If every person in the world treated each other like that, the world would be a much, much better place to be.

Why I Hate the Word "Literacy"

I hate the word literacy.

I spend a lot of time talking to my students about the connotation and denotation of words.  We spend much time debating the power of words and how we know what an author means.

So when powers greater than me start bandying about the word “literacy,” I sort of shrink a little inside.

In using the word literacy, what is often meant in the media and by government is the ability to read and write, usually in a “proficient” way to a potential employer.  To say that English teachers are teachers of literacy is only, therefore, partly true.  Is that all I am, as an English teacher?  A teacher of reading and writing so students can attain some level of proficiency as measured by an external test that determines their employability?

I disagree.  Pretty strongly, actually.  An English teacher is one who exposes students to ideas, to artistry, to imagination.  An English teacher is a person who teaches critical thinking, analysis, and creativity.  Through literature, the English teacher exposes students to worlds previously unknown and to ideas formerly unconsidered.  The English teacher demonstrates and encourages new avenues of communication through a variety of media and explores the authorial/directorial intent of all kinds of works. 

English teachers read, write, speak, listen, view, and represent WITH students.  Through that process, students learn how to interrelate in a community, how to value others’ thoughts and opinions, and how to express their own in a respectful, confident manner.  In short, students learn, with the help of English teachers, what it means to be more fully human, greater than they were before.

Is all of that inherent in the word “literacy?”  I think not.  To say we are “literacy” teachers is to diminish who and what we are.  We are teachers of English Language Arts.  Is literacy part of that?  Yes.  Is it ALL of it?  Not even close.