Self-Reflection and Purpose

My focus today is report cards. Although today is the day I am choosing to write them, they have actually been my focus for a couple of weeks now. In conversations with other educators, almost everyone I talk with, I have found the similar theme of self-reflection emerging.

Every teacher and administrator I have talked to recently is reflecting on how their students are doing in relation to a standard or a curriculum measurement. Questions like "Am I teaching anything well?" and "Have they learned anything?" are being asked by the second. My thoughts then turn to what affects learning? How do we measure learning? Is all of it measurable? What is our goal? This photo is a great start, but isn't there so much more to consider.

How do you measure:

how often a child cries at school

how often they come with a lunch

how much rest a child has gotten

what experiences they had on the weekend

how often they see their parents

how many people in their family died recently

how healthy they are

Measuring academically how children are doing based on standards is easy, but is it accurate? How can you measure a child's success against a set standard when that standard assumes everyone comes to school with the same set of skills and experiences. Each child is an individual and with that comes a great responsibility to treat them and teach them as such. It's difficult to write report cards and show learning when these other factors are so much stronger than a child's ability to take in, process, retain and utilize information. We still try to teach and continually look for ways to help children learn and remember and use skills. It is always my pursuit, through self-reflection, to try to do better by my students and remember they are individuals with desires.

My self-relfection recently got me into a conversation with one of my students. He is a 12 year old that by his actions seems to enjoy school, he adjusts well to it given a number of circumstances in his life that might derail others, but he has extreme difficulty reading. He has a keen interest in hockey and soccer. He wants to learn all about it and we have been using this interest to improve his reading skills. He is learning new vocabulary, learning mechanics and structures of language, improving fluency, learning comprehension strategies, learning research techniques, and many other skills (I hope)! More importantly he is learning about something he genuinely wants to learn about. In all this I am trying to work from the Grade 7 curriculum and encourage him to learn how to share his knowledge through modes other than writing (which is also very difficult for him!) I have been trying to convince him to share his learning with the younger students in the school that really look up to him, be the teacher rather than the learner. This is the conversation that I had with him.

He says "I'm bored." (having just walked through my door, I'm pretty certain this isn't true).

I say "Remember you aren't allowed to use that word, only boring people get bored. What else are you feeling?"

He says "School is hard. Outside school is fun. Being at home isn't hard. You make me do hard things at school."

I ask "What makes outside school fun?"

He says "I get to play Xbox."

I ask "What makes Xbox fun."

He says "Black Ops."

I ask "What makes Black Ops fun?"

He says "You get to shoot people with guns."

I ask "So you think we should shoot people at school with guns."

He says "No. There are zombies."

I ask "So there should be zombies at school."

He says "No."

I ask "So what about Xbox is fun."

He says "You get to play. Reading isn't fun, it's hard."

I say "Sometimes life is hard, it's not always going to be easy, but that's one reason we learn. So we can make it more fun, how do you want to do that?"

He says "I want to learn."

I say "That's good. So this photo essay and video we are thinking of doing is learning. Would it be more fun." (he earlier has decided this is not something he wants to do, but has not yet told me why.)

He says "I only want to learn, I don't want to show it. I don't want to share it." (now we are getting to the heart of the matter, risk taking!)

I ask "You don't want to share what you learn with anyone?"

He says "NOPE."

I say "Well I'm not going to force you to do anything, but how am I going to know if you have learned anything?"

He says "I just want to learn about lots of things."

The conversation went on from there and eventually we got down to reading but all was not lost. I think that part of being a self-reflective teacher is modelling and encouraging self-reflective thinking. I want my student to learn to read, but more importantly I want him to have his own purpose in learning and understand that he has some control over that (which was where the conversation went to.) I also want him to understand the importance of using what he learns and the importance of sharing to learning (that of others and his own.) even if that means taking a few risks.

Report cards, although they are sometimes difficult and sometimes time consuming, they are also a part of being a teacher. Reflecting on your teaching and the learning of your students isn't just for the purpose of measuring up against a standard, but to guide your purpose. So as an educator, what is my purpose? The same as it is outside my job. I hope to help others see their value. I'm not sure I can measure that on a report card, but I hope I can show it in the words I choose to use daily with my students and when reporting on their learning. This is the article I am going to read next, maybe a follow-up post in a few months!