The Over-Protected Kid

I recently read a great article in The Atlantic magazine (also online).  Hey! Parents, Leave Those Kids Alone, by Hanna Rosin, is all about the rise of the "over-protected kid" culture we now live in and what has been lost in childhood due to it.

As an educator and a parent I really connected with this article.  Rosin starts off at "The Land," an adventure playground that sounds much more theme-park like than it really is.  "The Land" is an acre-sized open space for kids to roam in North Wales, UK.  It has tire piles, pallets, a creek, mud, a fire-pit, and much more... all open and available for kids to explore.  I'm not sure if something like that exists in the lawsuit-happy USA, and if it did, I'm not sure I'd be comfortable leaving my kids.  "The Land" has a few adults who monitor the kids, interfering only in extreme situations, but generally staying out of the way and letting the kids roam free.  The reason being that "kids should face what to them seem like “really dangerous risks” and then conquer them alone."  This is what builds self-confidence and courage.

I agree with the idea.  I think kids are handed everything these days, being driven to playdates and sports practices, monitored 24/7.  I considered myself fairly laid-back as a parent, but even I find myself in irrational worry situations sometimes.  My kids, ages seven and eight, went on a "safari" around our neighborhood a few weeks ago.  They were super excited, packed up tons of stuff (bug collecting gear, a map, snacks, all the things they thought might be useful) and then went out.  I gave them firm boundaries, despite the fact that our neighborhood is quiet and safe.  The kids collected a few friends a long the way and had a great time, but I spent the entire two hours totally nervous when I couldn't see them from a window.  At one point they went inside a house to wait for friends to get ready and my heart started racing.  Oh no, I forgot to tell them not to go into houses!  I barely know that family (except they are elderly, raising grandkids, always very friendly when we see them outside, and have been known to bring over fresh-from-the-oven cookies to share) and now my kids are in their home!  Pure, irrational panic.  The kids were fine, of course, had a great time, and learned a few things about winter safaris.  In a different era that would have been a normal afternoon, not a parental milestone that took more courage for me than for them.

In the article Rosin also discusses the rise of playground safety standards, brought about largely by lawsuits in the 1970s.  Now playgrounds have very strict, very detailed, safety standards covering heights and angles of slides, spacing between bars, depth and type of padding below surfaces and much, much more.  Playgrounds have become so safe and sterile that children are bored by them.  Happening across an old playground is an exciting and novel experience for children.  I know of one playground that still has a merry-go-round, one that you can actually push and spin around, not a fancy musical one with slow moving horses.  Kids love it!  "Children are born with the instinct to take risks in play, because historically, learning to negotiate risk has been crucial to survival; in another era, they would have had to learn to run from some danger, defend themselves from others, be independent. Even today, growing up is a process of managing fears and learning to arrive at sound decisions. By engaging in risky play, children are effectively subjecting themselves to a form of exposure therapy, in which they force themselves to do the thing they’re afraid of in order to overcome their fear. But if they never go through that process, the fear can turn into a phobia."  Super-safe playground eliminate all risk, thereby eliminating opportunities for children to face their fears.

Are playgrounds safer now?  Do injury rates go down as playground safety standards go up?  Studies say no.  Because kids have this inborn need for risk they just use the playground structures in unintended, riskier way, like climbing on top of the covered slide, or walking across the top of the monkey-bars, in places where monkey bars are still allowed.  The "safer" the structures get, the more creative the kids get, or else they lose interest altogether, which is something we see on school playgrounds.  When kids go out for recess they are closely monitored by recess teachers enforcing strict rules such as no running in the structures, no climbing up the slides (something kids LOVE to do!), and no wrestling.  All intended to reduce injury at school, but also reducing risk and challenge for the kids.

I had recess duty one winter day and I saw a group of fifth grade boys wrestling in the snow.  I watched them for a few minutes and everyone seemed to be having fun, though one boy was frequently on the bottom.  At one point I went over, paused the game, and checked in with the bottom kid.  He was laughing and having a great time.  I walked away.  A few minutes later another recess teacher came over and separated the boys, reminding them of the "no wrestling" rule, a rule I wasn't aware of at the time.  I understand it from a school liability standpoint, by oh what a loss.  Fifth grade boys really need that opportunity to get their energy out, to run, and rough-house.  That's how they learn and grow, testing their strengths and weakness, testing their roles with dominance, testing their muscles, and just getting their physical energy out.  Instead they come in all wound up and bickering and we, as teacher, are supposed to push that aside and try to refocus them on academics.

I see the same thing in kindergarten each day.  The five year olds are bored of the play structure and instead find ways to bug each other, then bring the bickering back to the classroom.  There is no physical challenge for them at recess, no testing boundaries, no pushing themselves, no way for them to clearly work out the social dynamics they need to learn.  Instead they turn to teachers, asking the adults to work out every minor disagreement for them. 

A school in New Zealand agreed to participate in an experiment suspending all playground rules, "allowing the kids to run, climb trees, slide down a muddy hill, jump off swings, and play in a “loose-parts pit” that was like a mini adventure playground. The teachers feared chaos, but in fact what they got was less naughtiness and bullying—because the kids were too busy and engaged to want to cause trouble, the principal said."

Could we do that in this country?  Probably not, especially without written permission from the parents of every child.  Is it the ultimate answer to the problem, no, of course not, but I think it would be a start.  Suspend or perhaps just reduce the rules.  Of course that would require a change in liability, and a change in the parents' perspectives.  Change, Rosin says, will have to come from the parents.  She feels the culture is starting to slowly shift, with many parenting books appearing on shelves advocating a more relaxed, hands-off parenting style.  Change, I agree, will have to come from the parents, but as a parent I know it will be easier said than done. 

Digraphs

Last month I visited several other schools and classrooms.  I've done so both semesters, each time focusing on grades near my placement.  In the fall I visited 4/5/6 grade classrooms and last month I observed K/1 classrooms.  The purpose to is see how other classrooms are run, how other teachers do things, and to get more ideas about what type of school and classroom you'd like to have.  I love the idea and I'm so glad it's part of the UVEI program.

In one of the classrooms I observed the students were discussing the H brothers and practicing making their sounds.  The teacher had a neat chart to go with it and clearly the students were familiar with the story and enjoyed it.  I snapped a picture and brought it back to show my mentor teacher.  She loved the idea and asked if I'd make a poster for our classroom too.   Happily!

With inspiration from the first poster and a few I found on Pinterest, I made three digraph posters this weekend.  Three because I made one for her classroom, one for the other kindergarten teacher, and one for myself!

In this second picture the poster looks a little funny, but it's just because the top was curling up.  I didn't make fancy shaped edges.  I printed a copy of the H brothers story from Project Read and glued it to the back of the poster.  I laminated them at school this morning and now I'm looking forward to introducing this story and poster to my kindergarten class.

In my Internet wanderings I came across a few funny digraph YouTube videos as well.   A teacher put up a series of kid videos here and this is a totally silly video called We Are The H Brothers, with four grown men wearing Th/Ch/Sh/Wh t-shirts and doing very silly things.  There are a lot of resources out there these days!

 

TCAP

This year UVEI is participating in the New Hampshire IHE Teacher Common Assessment of Performance (TCAP) program, a pilot program to design a state-wide teacher assessment.  I believe other states are doing similar things, all with the hope, I think, that it will go nationwide in the near future.

I like the idea of a common assessment so teachers are assessed using the same standards across the board, much like students with the Common Core State Standards.  I'm not saying they have to teach the same things or the same way, but it makes sense to me that there would be common factors in the assessments, much like the standards that exist for other professions.

This TCAP pilot program is not a requirement for UVEI, but they gave us the option and encouraged anyone to try.  I decided it would be a good way to challenge myself, pushing my learning at UVEI further.  It has given me the opportunity to think deeply about my lesson process, from the initial examination of the class through to the assessments and lesson reflections.  The whole process is considered.

For my lesson series I started with the Bridges in Mathematics program, which we use at my current school.  We were approaching a series of lessons around story problems, so I decided to do my TCAP project with that.  I created a four-part lesson series based on the Bridges program and tailored to my particular class.  I did case studies of several students and considered how to address their needs, and those of the class as a whole, in my lesson plans.

A student created story problem.

I then taught, recorded, and reflected on my lessons.  The lessons included acting out story problems, using sea creature plastic figures to create story problems with manipulatives, drawing our own story problems, and then solving the problems the students created.  The four-part series ended up being five lessons in total because the class thoroughly enjoyed the final lesson, solving story problems their peers had created, and wanted to continue past our available time.  For the fifth lesson we reviewed the first four, reviewed story problem solving strategies, and then tackled some of the more challenging problems the students had created. 

Using strategies to solve a story problem.

While teaching the lessons I made observational assessments on a formative assessment checklist I maintained throughout the lesson series.  I also collected the story problems the students created and I had them each solve one story problem on paper so I could collect that as well.  I scored those two work samples against a rubric I created for this project. 

I'm now in the final writing stages of the TCAP project, making sure I've addressed all of the questions answered, thoroughly analyzed my video clips, checked and double-checked my writing, and then checked it all over again.  Then I will submit it to UVEI and see where it goes from there.

Then, on to the next writing piece!  No shortage of planning, reflecting, and writing in a teacher's busy day!

A literacy conference

I went to the Vermont Council on Reading's spring conference today at the beautiful Stoweflake Mountain Resort and Spa.  The topic this year was "Building Literate Lives Through Common Core Standards" and Gay Su Pinnell was the keynote speaker.  In her introduction the presenter said it would be her last conference keynote event, but she seems far too energetic for this to be her last speaking engagement ever, so I'm not sure what exactly they meant by that.  For her keynote she talked about how to encourage a love of learning and the importance of reading for meaning and understanding, not just for speed.  "Giving the gift of a literate life should be our goal for our students," she said. 

In the afternoon Q&A she talked about leveled reading and the importance of not broadcasting a child's F&P level.  There was a discussion around whether or not to share the specific level with parents (she says no) and the pros and cons of doing so.  The pros being that parents want to know and it's an easy way to mark progress.  The cons being that it is important not to rank children by reading level and you run the risk of making it a competition.  Parents often don't understand the importance of fluency, not just speed reading.  Pinnell talked about fluency as involving many parts, including phrasing, pausing, word stress, intonation, rate, and integration.  There's more to it than just comprehension.  She recommended a book titled "The Art of Slow Reading," by Tom Newkirk as a starting point for thoughtful consideration of text.   

In the mid part of the day we attended breakout sessions.  I went to one called "Asking Questions, Answering Questions, and Everything in Between: Making Learning Visible with the Common Core Standards (K-8)."  I think they are just throwing the term "common core standards" at the end of everything these days!  Very little of the conference dealt with the CCSS at all.  The parts I attended anyway, perhaps some of the other breakout sessions touched on it more.  My breakout session had an interesting sounding title, but in truth had very little to do with making learning visible.  She did however have interesting thoughts on promoting social change.  She touched briefly on learning walls and demonstrated an interesting, interactive version of Reader's Theater which she called "imagery theater."  Using the book "The Story of Ruby Bridges", she showed us a way to pause the story (after having read it through to the children at least once, possibly several times), have students volunteer to play roles from the story and act out a scene.  At a pivotal moment have your actors freeze while the rest of the class walks around them, discussing what is going on and presenting alternative options for how the story could continue.  It creates a powerful way for children to change the outcome of a story, to be the agents of change. 

I had the good fortune to carpool with a fellow UVEI intern, so we had time for lots of great discussions and idea sharing.  Add in the sunshine and our lunch-time walk and I'd say it was a great day!

“We read in bed because reading is halfway between life and dreaming, our own consciousness in someone else's mind.”
― Anna Quindlen, How Reading Changed My Life

Assessment mistake

Last week I taught my kindergarten class a science unit on force and motion. It wasn't a unit I created, but one that an intern in the other kindergarten created last year and the teachers liked, so I offered to teach it this year. On the third day we did a hands-on experiment where the students each got a chance to push little wooden cars through four different buckets, each containing a different substance: wet sand, dry sand, water, and air. At the end of the lesson I gave them an assessment showing the four items and told them to X the one that took the most force and circle the one that took the least force. I was going to give them clipboards and spread them around the room, but we ran out of time so I just had them sit at their seats. I repeated the simple (or so I thought) two-step instructions several times and even looked around the room for a quick place to write them down, but nothing was convenient so I just repeated them again.

The first two students handed in correct sheets, then a third student handed in a sheet with three circles and one X. Two more marks than needed and completely invalidating the assessment. I grabbed my one remaining blank copy and started to re-explain the directions. Before I got far though, other students started handing in their papers and I noticed every kid hand marked all four items with Xs or circles. All of them did it! I sighed, shook my head, and just started collecting them.

When I showed my mentor teacher she just laughed. She said, "I knew, as soon as you gave two step directions, things would not go well!" She had chosen, wisely, to let me learn that lesson all on my own. We both had a good laugh.

The next morning I made more copies of the assessment and pulled the kids aside one by one, telling them I had given them incorrect directions and asking them to redo the task. Many of them found it amusing that the teacher had made a mistake.

For the final assessment at the end of the unit I was careful to take them through the directions one step at a time. "First circle all the things you can push," pause, pause, pause, "Next put an X through the things that are moving," etc. My final assessments came out much better! :)