I will aggressively filter all emails so that I see only the important emails. If I miss some once in a while, that’s all right. If it were truly important that person would find a way to contact me, and if I mess up sometimes because a message goes into my bulk mail folder, it’s a cost I’m willing to pay for preserving my attention.

I will not check my work email Friday to Saturday night. That can wait.

The first time I check my email will be when I’m on the subway ride to school. I will not check it in bed. I will not check it in the bathroom. I will not check it while eating breakfast. Instead, I will read, I will exercise, I will take my time pampering myself a little before getting to school.

I will not turn on email notifications. That distracts me from my real work. Sure I’ll miss time sensitive information sometimes, but if it were truly important, that person would find a way to contact me (text is always good). My job is to think ahead, not to be stuck in the now.

I will check my email once before school, once in the morning, once in the afternoon, and once in the evening. I will not check my email any other times. My before school check in and evening check ins are when I process emails, my mid morning and mid afternoon check ins are just to check for anything super urgent.

I will rule my email. My email does not rule me.

Dash4Teachers is an iPhone app that makes contacting and documenting parent communication incredibly fast, easy, and productive.
 
With Dash, teachers have parent phone numbers and email addresses in one easy place. Teachers can also make notes of student behavior, both positive and negative, so that information is captured in-the-moment instead of forgotten by the time they are able to call their student’s parents. Most importantly, Dash keeps a running record of all parent communication so that teachers can make sure no students are overlooked and that patterns in student behavior are addressed.
 
Ultimately, Dash solves three major problems that currently plague teachers as they do their best to communicate with parents:
- What number do I use to contact my student’s parents?
- (At the end of a long and busy day) What do I need to call about again?
- Who haven’t I checked in with for a while?
 
Best practices for using this app: 
- Use Dash to track what percentage of your calls to a student’s parents have been about positive things, and what percentage has been about negative things. Work to keep the positivity above 70%.
- Build parent communication into your daily routine, such as calling at least two parents every day as you walk out of the school, so that over the course of a month, you’ll contact every student’s parents at least once.
- Use Dash to immediately document behavior, both positive and negative, that you want to call home about, so that you don’t forget later.
- Use Dash’s sorting features to figure out which students you may be overlooking, or which students need more positive feedback. For example, sort by least recent to see which students you haven’t called in a while, fewest calls to see which students haven’t received as many phone calls, and positivity to figure out which students you need to give positive feedback to.
 
Pros
- The Dash4Teacher’s team is incredibly responsive. They are always ready to troubleshoot as well as to improve their product based on teacher feedback.
- All the information you need to contact parents — phone numbers, behavior notes, and historical documentation — are in one place.
- Dash4Teacher’s user interface is intuitive and fast. You can use a single tap to add a student to a call list. With a single glance, you can also see if that student’s ratio of positive calls to negative calls is positive, neutral, or negative.
- Dash4Teacher’s sorting functionality is very powerful and flexible. You can sort by all sorts of useful categories such as Least Recent, Fewest Calls, Least Positive, and No Working Contacts.
- You can easily upload an initial spreadsheet of student names and parent contact information by using your Manage My Dash account on www.dash4teachers.com.
- Student contact information is always up-to-date – Dash keeps track of which  numbers are disconnected, makes your working numbers into “Favorites,” and allows you to easily add more contact information.
- Student contact information and call logs are always synced and safely backed up. Even if you lose your phone or change phones, your data is online in your Manage My Dash account.
 
Cons
- You cannot create student groups yet so that you can group-text, group-email, or group-call but this is high on Dash’s list of priorities.
- It isn’t possible, yet, to sync student contact information with other colleagues using Dash with the same students. One workaround is to have everyone on a team sign in on the same account, but this is suboptimal. Again, this functionality is high on Dash’s list of priorities.
- Sorting by Most or Least Recent calls can take a long time if you have a lot of students or have made a lot of calls. You’ll just need to wait a moment while Dash does its thing.
 
There you have it. Download Dash4Teachers in the App Store today! And, let me know what you think in the comments! How do you envision Dash4Tech changing your teacher life for the better?

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Bonus note. Dash4Teachers was started by three kick-apple TFA teachers who were trying to solve a problem that we all have. See the rest of their story, here: www.dash4teachers.com.

Our group of teachers, four hundred strong, fanned out along the streets to pick up trash. About thirty of us ended up walking along a street that ended in an empty lot.

Empty or abandoned lots have traditionally been the bane of urban development. They can be trash-strewn, sites of questionable activity, and a general eye sore. The empty lot we found was no exception. It contained a huge pile of trash that included an abandoned cooler filled with tepid water from weeks of rainfall, bags of discarded clothes, a dirty blue tarp buzzing with blood sucking insects, the broken remains of a Fisher Price toy, and at least two soiled diapers, among hundreds of other pieces of cardboard, paper, cans, and broken glass. In other words, tackling that pile of trash seemed completely daunting. It was not a one person, two person, or even ten person job. And, there was plenty of other trash to pick up, just not in such a concentrated area.

So, what did we do? We ignored it.

I overheard one teacher say, “I think it’s so ironic that we’re spending all our time picking up little bits of trash here when just across the street there’s this huge pile.” Yet, she didn’t move over to start cleaning it up. Other teachers headed over to the lot and started staring at the pile, but didn’t make a move to clean it. Still others went to the other parts of the lot to pick up trash there, but still, they didn’t touch the pile. At one point, someone actually threw a rusted piece of metal into pile, probably thinking, “At least we can consolidate the trash.”

Perhaps we were scared. Perhaps we didn’t want to start cleaning the pile up if we knew we couldn’t finish it on our own. Perhaps the thought of lugging entirely full trash bags back to Jones High School seemed too unappealing. But mostly, I think we were afraid that if we started cleaning up the pile, we would be alone, and no one else would join because they thought the problem was too big, and so we would have to give up, and so we would have failed. That’s why even people who thought the pile should be cleaned, didn’t move to start picking it up. I certainly felt that way.

All it took was a statement and a building of a team. I turned to one of the teachers who was looking at the pile, clearly wanting to clean it up, and said, “I think with twenty people, we could do it.” I called out to a friend, “Hey, come help us with this.”

Someone asked, “How do we take the trash back? Maybe we can leave it on the side and the city will pick it up.” I said, “I’ll go check.” Thank goodness for the teacher that said, “But look at all the plastic bags in this pile. I think that other people thought that, and left bags here, and dogs got to them and tore them open, or they were just never picked up.” She pushed us to not settle. Someone else joined in. “We could walk trash bags back to the school, and I can bring extra bags back.” “Are we doing this?” “Yeah, we’re doing this.”

In the end, it took just fifteen people, not twenty. It was a lot easier than I think we expected. And, even walking that trash back to the high school was not the big deal we thought it would be. We simply filled out trash bags only about two-thirds of the way to ensure that they wouldn’t burst or be too heavy. All it took was a statement and a building of a team.

I can’t help but think of this as a metaphor for other problems in our world today. What problems are we ignoring now because they just seem too big? What problems could we be leaving to fester and pile up, much like we almost left that pile of trash in the empty lot, when really all it takes is a statement of purpose and a team of people who say, “Yeah, we’re doing this”? And even when we are tackling a problem, are we settling for less? Are we scared?

My personal reflection is that I’ve been treating the issue of poverty like I was first tempted to treat that pile of trash. I’ve been thinking that the issue of poverty is just too big of a problem, so I’ll focus only on education, that we would never solve it because of a myriad of constraints, so I’ll leave it to other people to try. I know poverty is much more complicated of a problem than temporarily clearing out a pile of trash, and that the team that must be built is much larger, but I can’t help but think that maybe we just lack the will right now, to do what’s right, and I will no longer allow myself to give excuses. I will at least try.

Why?

One, we suck at it.

Two, it takes too much time.

Three, there are better things that we could be doing.

Here’s the pitch. Given that there are already experts who love curriculum design, who have the time, experience, and research, to have created units that already anticipate student misunderstandings and that already align state and national standards to assessments to activities, a new teacher’s value added is not in designing the curriculum, but in doing all the things that the curriculum designers can not do because they are not there, with our students, in those precious moments of learning.

A new teacher should be spending his or her time modifying the curriculum for his or her unique situation and unique kids, in tutoring and in giving feedback, and in supplementing the curriculum when he or she discovers gaps in the students’ understanding that are not adequately addressed by the curriculum. Perhaps even more importantly, a new teacher should be calling home to connect with families, going to sudent sports games and music recitals and dance showcases to build relationships, to growing as a teacher professionally by observing master teachers, reading, and planning new techniques to try. Finally, a new teacher should be exercising, and sleeping, both things that often drop by the wayside those first few years.

Far from being confining, I think a rich curriculum which maps out an entire year’s worth of assessments and activities, would be empowering, giving me back hours of my day, every day, so that I can be awake, refreshed, and ready to interact with my kids and respond to their needs, instead of being buried in work on my computer screen, only guessing at what might or might not work. And slowly, as I grow as a professional, I can then move into curriculm design myself, but just like my students, I need time, and I need support, in order to get there.

What would you be doing with your time if you weren’t creating curriculum?

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Curricula that I admire because they are true to the idea that students are active learners who create their own understanding of the world include:

Reading Like a Historian from the Stanford History Education Group, which teaches high school history through diving deep into primary documents: http://sheg.stanford.edu/?q=node/45

Investigating and Questioning our World Through Science and Technology from the University of Michigan and Northwestern University, which teaches middle school science through inquiry-based units which build deep conceptual understanding: http://www.umich.edu/~hiceweb/iqwst/index.html

The Inquiry Project by TERC, which guides third to fifth graders on a journey of discovery about the particle model of matter: http://inquiryproject.terc.edu/

That leaves one grade level teacher for the 7 hours we have our kids every single day. 7 hours with 99 kids. 99 kids whose only guarantee is that they will find a way exhilarate, inspire, and exasperate you.

What would your school do?

Mine told me to stay at home and rest.

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Note: This was written a month ago and posted just now… we’ve all recovered, now!

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Edit: At my school, we try to use as few substitutes as possible. Our message to the students is that we respect and value you as individuals, and, every moment counts. Unfortunately it’s hard for a substitute to be consistent with those two messages… This time we did hire a substitute for one of the days I was out (the history and math classes were covered by our two awesome deans as well as the sixth grade math teacher who cleared their schedule to help out), and when I came back I needed to reteach the objective as well as spend some time debriefing with the students, many of whom were upset because the substitute’s predominant classroom management strategy was to yell.
Furthermore, a ton of the work we do at my school is not directly in the classroom, but rather in holding each student accountable for each piece of their homework everyday and getting to the bottom of every student issue (from potential bullying, to writing on the wall, to coaching students on how to have a productive conversation if someone jostles them in the hallway). A substitute just can’t replace that aspect of teaching, the character development of our children.
Because of this, it’s hard for me to easily take days off, and I’m harder on myself than I should be. My grade level chair and school leaders know this about me, so they always play the role of supporting me and telling me to get rest. We all work hard at my school, we see everyday how much our students have to learn, so the message we hear as teachers from the school is not, work harder, it’s, take care of yourself. And that, more than anything has made me really appreciate my school.

A staple of any school interview is a debrief conversation about the demo lesson. Upon further reflection, what I should have said was…

“I made one major miscalculation, and that was assuming that the first graders who have been working on sink/float and push/pull the last week, had learned those words in the context of the ‘force’. When I asked the students, ‘What is force?’ at the beginning of the lesson, I assumed that they would easily tell me, ‘force is a push or a pull’. My lesson aim was for them to apply the word force in a context that would be unfamiliar with them, and to explore the idea that we design tools that reduce the amount of force we need to use to do a job.

Problem was, when I asked, ‘What is a force?’, one student said, ‘Force is a brain’. My face fell, that’s when I realized the prior knowledge I thought these first graders had was not there. It wasn’t until I got to ‘What do forces do?’ where I received an answer that I could work with, that forces make things move.

I could have adjusted course much more fully than I did. In the demo lesson, I sent them off to work on a writing component at their desks and circulated widely as well as called out examples of strong writing that explained what it took to open a binder clip (a push or a squeeze… all examples of forces). I adjusted by giving them more time to write and more individualized feedback. I also adjusted by doing a lot of call and response in the front where we practiced saying “A force is a push or pull that changes how an object moves.”

A stronger response would have been to change the aim entirely and make a split-second decision to pull back from applied forces and focus more on the actual word force, integrating more call and response so that students could practice saying ‘force’. ‘Say it with me, “fff” “fff” “fff” “or” “or” “or” “ce” “ce” “ce” “force”!

Then we would have modeled writing using the word force together as group practice before having the students independently write.

Finally, there when the student responded ‘Force is a brain’, I could have asked ‘Why do you think that?’ That would have affirmed his response as well as given me that time to do the mid-course correction I proposed in my reflection.”

Clearly, regardless of what the KIPP NYC decisions are, I learned a ton about elementary teaching! Thanks, KIPP NYC.

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Originally posted here: http://wp.me/pZpWN-6t

Update: I received the job offer!

The vision is for teachers to be able to search #teachertiptuesdays and a keyword of their choice like (organize papers) and then have a plethora of how to posts to choose from.

Any teacher can also join in on the fun to post their own Teacher Tip Tuesdays.

Guidelines for good posts include:
- Answers a very specific question (Not, “How do I get my students to behave?” but rather, “How do I make sure my students don’t begin moving until AFTER I’ve finished giving directions?”
- Immediately actionable (For example, if my advice is to buy a certain book and read it, I’ll include the Amazon.com link.)
- Invites feedback and conversation

The reason I think this would be valuable would be because it helps educators to self-reflect on what they’ve learned through their teaching and because I have yet to find a single go-to place for all my teaching questions. Instead, the resources are rather scattered.

What do you think about this idea?

I commit to 100% of my students being 100% engaged, 100% of the time. This means that if I or another student am talking, all eyes are on the speaker, all voices are off, and all attention is focused on processing what the speaker is saying. This also means that during labs and explorations, each and every student is actively problem-solving, collaborating, asking questions, and seeking answers. If these expectations are not met, I will not scream, I will not yell, I will not be angry, I will just ask that my students do it again. And do it again. And do it again. Children rise to the expectations I set.

I commit to 100% of my students reaching their growth goals in academics. This means that my student reading at the first grade reading level in the fifth grade will receive individual tutoring to give him the support he needs to grow leaps and bounds. This also means that my students coming in already mastering 80% of the course content will be challenged to lead classes themselves and do a deep study of extension topics that are one, two, or even three grade levels above their current grade.

I commit to 100% of my students mastering the course content and skills, skills that will set them up for success far into their futures. I will track data relentlessly to catch any students falling through the cracks in understanding. I will think creatively to be an effective explainer. I will empower so that students are masters of their own learning.

I commit to 100% of my students reaching their growth goals in character. I will see the strengths in every child, and help him or her develop those strengths. I will nurture trustworthiness, honesty, integrity, kindliness, and community. I will work with students to set personal goals that they are invested in reaching, and celebrate with them as they work towards those goals.

I commit to never, ever, insisting on anything less than 100%.

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Originally posted as part of my series on Students for Education Reform. Please leave comments there: http://www.studentsforedreform.org/2011/11/10/memo-from-the-trenches-my-commitment-for-the-school-year/

On the first challenge, my lessons are taking twice as long as I plan them to take. I think the next step is to sit down with someone, go through a lesson plan together, and then have them observe to see what I can do to be more effective with my time in the classroom. In fact, I’m going to email my TFA MTLD* and ask him to do that right now.

Also a concern with pacing is that my long term plan (was) 76 days over the amount of time I have with my students. However, thank goodness for good coaches. My science department head sat down with me this past Thursday, showed me how I needed to prioritize my time with each unit, and started me off on the right track in terms of fixing my long-term plan so that my students will master the standards they need to master by the end of the year.

One thing that we did together that was really powerful, was to completely take out the 21 days I had originally scheduled for “STAAR** Olympics”, which is a really contrived way to get students excited to do test prep. Basically, I had originally planned that for a whole four weeks, my students would be rotating through stations that would help them remember all the topics we’ve learned and would give them opportunities to answer a bunch of test items. I did this last year, and the kids loved it because they worked with computers at one station, earned “TAKS bucks***” which they could use at the “TAKS store”, and also had responsibilities like “Tutor” and “Store Manager”.

Yes, my students did well last year, and yes, I’m sure the test prep helped some of them, especially the computerized independent practice and intensive after school tutoring, but honestly, test prep is a shortcut for what really should be meaningful cumulative review throughout the year and targeted tutoring and small group instruction. So, while scary, I am fully stepping away from test prep and instead, teaching until that last day before TAKS, and teaching right on afterwards, too. State tests weren’t a big deal for me in my high performing public school, nor is it a big deal for any other high performing school, so why should it be for my students? Yes, they should take it seriously, and yes, I think the testing data is necessary, but because I’m not going to receive the STAAR test results in time to inform my own teaching, I’m not going to let it distort what our class is here to do this year, which is to grow as scientists, be Knowledge Creators, and be interdependent.

The level of rigor I’ll hold my students to will be much higher than their performance on the state standardized test.

Finally, my second, and related challenge, is the effective use of data to track my student’s growth and help them reach and exceed mastery in all of their objectives. I’m doing a much better job this year of challenging my highest performers, because even those who’ve memorized a lot of science don’t know everything in an inquiry based classroom, but I am still not being effective with data. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that I have yet to build a feedback system that I am satisfied with, that:

• Gives informal feedback on a daily basis
• Gives formal feedback on a weekly basis
• Has structures for individual check-ins and growth meetings
• Has structures for student self-proposed assessments
• Requires only a sane amount of grading and data entry (Because honestly, my time is better spent doing things that require thinking. Why we don’t have this system automated yet drives me batty on a daily basis).

*MTLD = Manager of Teacher Leadership Development, i.e. my TFA instructional coach
**STAAR = State of Texas Assessment of Academic Readiness, Texas’s new state test.
***TAKS = Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills, Texas’s old state test. “TAKS Bucks” are just a made-up currency that students could use to buy things like popcorn, candy, small toys and trinkets.

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Originally posted on Science Never Sucks, a WordPress.com blog.