"What's 'updog'?" you ask.
I don't know! What's up with you?!!
I revive that silly joke every couple of months with the girls, because it never seems to lose its hilarity with the elementary school set.
What's up with this dog, though? I know; I haven't written in a week! I've been cooking curry, building more sandcastles, running, getting to know my newly-minted five-year-old (geez! Five comes in like a lion!), having sleepovers, connecting with former students who need a little TLC, and, well, doing laundry and emptying the dishwasher.
Speaking of emptying the dishwasher, I thought about writing about Marital Stalemates this week. You know, the silent detentes that occur when neither partner cares to complete a task and both parties passively/aggressively work around it?
For example, my husband will wash many dishes rather than empty the dishwasher and reload it. And, on occasion, I will pile on. Eventually, someone breaks (or occasionally a dish).
There's something more reassuring than annoying, I've decided, about recognizing the silent dialogues which occur in the context of a marriage. The paper towel roll, for example, placed next to but not into its holder, utters a familiar refrain. As does the pile of clean laundry I shove back in the dryer versus fold when friends come over. The lone beer bottle in the fridge...or the last beer taken. The reusable grocery bags waiting by the front door to return to the car trunk. The dog needing to go out and the child awake in the middle of the night. My parents employed rock-paper-scissors for diaper changes, etc. Tag, you're it, we mumble as we roll over or lie still, feigning sleep. While the other sighs and gets up.
The whisper of exasperation but ultimate patience we have for each other is actually...wonderful.
That's all!
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Happy Birthday, Boodles
My baby, you're five today. Five! A whole hand. Take that in your face.
Five means kindergarten. Five means no more toddler bed. Five means reading and writing. Five means a fistful of minutes, hours, and days you clutch as you wriggle and leap from my grasp.
This year I watched your babyhood fade and the big girl grow, your legs longer and leaner, your senses keener, your observations more insightful.
You asked for these footy panda pajamas for Christmas because you know how they make you snuggly and still young, which you will always be. But each night, like clockwork, you yell from your bed that you're hot, and I yell back the same suggestion: take your jammies off. And so you do. Only to wiggle into them again in the morning after you emerge from your bedroom, half naked and bleary eyed, to give me a hug.
We claim that you're delightfully easygoing, our go-to gal for going with the flow. But when you're grumpy, watch out. You still know how to throw a cringe-worthy tantrum and you're no fun on too little sleep.
There's a certain self sufficiency to you that catches us off guard. You put your stuff away. You know where to find things. You taught yourself to tie your shoes, to ponytail your hair, to fold your clothes. And then you ask us to brush your teeth, in case we're wondering if still you need us.
You kick our fannies at concentration games (how do you DO that?); you are the master of goofy faces; you're a sweet caretaker of children younger than you; you know just how to push your big sister's buttons.
You love penguins, pizza, sweet stuff, dolls, "flatted" blankets, tunafish, shoes, leggings, your cousins, holding hands, and poring over family photo albums.
You're a loyalist at heart, dear Bear--forever ours, but already your own.
We love you. High five!
Five means kindergarten. Five means no more toddler bed. Five means reading and writing. Five means a fistful of minutes, hours, and days you clutch as you wriggle and leap from my grasp.
This year I watched your babyhood fade and the big girl grow, your legs longer and leaner, your senses keener, your observations more insightful.
You asked for these footy panda pajamas for Christmas because you know how they make you snuggly and still young, which you will always be. But each night, like clockwork, you yell from your bed that you're hot, and I yell back the same suggestion: take your jammies off. And so you do. Only to wiggle into them again in the morning after you emerge from your bedroom, half naked and bleary eyed, to give me a hug.
We claim that you're delightfully easygoing, our go-to gal for going with the flow. But when you're grumpy, watch out. You still know how to throw a cringe-worthy tantrum and you're no fun on too little sleep.
There's a certain self sufficiency to you that catches us off guard. You put your stuff away. You know where to find things. You taught yourself to tie your shoes, to ponytail your hair, to fold your clothes. And then you ask us to brush your teeth, in case we're wondering if still you need us.
You kick our fannies at concentration games (how do you DO that?); you are the master of goofy faces; you're a sweet caretaker of children younger than you; you know just how to push your big sister's buttons.
You love penguins, pizza, sweet stuff, dolls, "flatted" blankets, tunafish, shoes, leggings, your cousins, holding hands, and poring over family photo albums.
You're a loyalist at heart, dear Bear--forever ours, but already your own.
We love you. High five!
Monday, February 14, 2011
Happy Valentine's Day
Don't be afrayed, strong heart.
"Let yourself be silently drawn by the pull of what you really love." --Rumi
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Card Someone
A former student of mine sends me (and others) postcards now and then as part of her own "Postcard Project." Sometimes the brief message is a non sequitur, sometimes it's a sweet greeting, and sometimes it's an update on her life or inquiry into mine. My creative friend is a poet, editor, and "stationer"--see her line of cards and paper here. She's inspired me to send her some postal love in return, so before the holidays I bought a set of 100 "Postcards from Penguin," featuring book covers from the publishing house. I am setting aside a few minutes--on Monday mornings in particular--to send off a couple cards each week.
To initiate your own postcard project, you need only a roll of postcard stamps, a stack of postcards (you may even have some squired away somewhere), and an inclination to snail mail someone from time to time. It feels good, I tell you! And it's cheap and easy. I've enjoyed looking for the right card to match the right sentiment for the right person (for example, the postcard featuring the cover of the novel 1984 went to my best friend, with some thoughts on what "Big Brother" might have seen if he were watching us back when we were in 7th grade).
If you need more immediate gratification than sending postcards to friends and hoping they'll respond in kind, check out Postcrossing or The Postcard Project. My former student introduced me to Postcrossing, and in high school she was one of the students intrigued by PostSecret, a website which publishes postcards created and sent by anonymous contributors revealing secrets (watch out: it's a voyeuristic window into rooms that are usually locked...).
If you're feeling really crafty, make your own postcard and mail it. And if you're feeling creative, go all metaphorical and "send" a postcard from a figurative place (as I had my creative writing students do). Think about where you are right now, and where you could write from (for example, to my forty-something self, from my self in college). What would you tell your now self from your then self? What would your now self tell your future self? You could also write from inside your brain or heart, from "in limbo," from dire straits, from the crossroads...
Anyway, I would keep some postcard stamps handy. Just sayin'.
Friday, February 4, 2011
Forty!
To prepare for the transition, I ditched the lipstick brush and Pilates videos, but piles of papers and clothes await my attention--a testament to the fact that I'm really still me, whether I'm 22, 35, or 40 years old.
Tonight, I'm going home to have dinner and a movie snugglenest with my husband and daughters; I can't imagine a better way to celebrate the passing and beginning of another year of my life.
Here's to not fearing my forties. Happy Birthday to me!
(and many more)
Monday, January 31, 2011
Race to Nowhere: On Choosing a Route and Destination
I wrote last week about my thoughts on homework's role in education in response to our community's showing of the documentary film Race to Nowhere. Tonight, Big Sis's homework was some simple experiments with weight distribution--trying to pick up an object with heels against the wall, and determining if her body was more stable standing or sitting. Her assignment was fun and easy but encouraged deeper thought and some "Aha!"s. It didn't require glitter or popsicle sticks or a parent's master's degree: that's what I'm talking about.
But the film Race to Nowhere is about more than homework; it argues that "the whole culture needs to revise what is important and what is not." So this week I explore the role of families in helping kids define What Is Important, and how our schools can support healthy options.
Posted on the bulletin board at Little Sis's preschool is an article titled "Want to Get Your Kids into College? Let Them Play." The article's authors, an early childhood teacher and professor of medicine and sociology at Harvard, allude to a study which shows that more opportunities for imaginative play in early childhood (particularly in groups) yield greater chances of success in school and beyond. Make-believe activities support the development of self-regulation, and self-regulating individuals are less likely to drop out, commit crimes, and abuse substances. It turns out that our daughter's preschool, with its multi-age classroom and fairly unstructured curriculum, allows ample opportunity for free playtime.
Big Sis attended this neighborhood preschool too, which I confess we chose primarily for reasons of convenience and because relatives' and friends' children were happily enrolled there too. But on Big Sis's first day of kindergarten, when she placed her backpack over the chair at her tidy new desk, sat quietly on her designated square on the mat, and brought home her first official homework, I was grateful for her preschool in all its free-flowingness. On that first day of kindergarten I could see the remainder of my daughter's life stretching before her, with playtime coming second to All The Important Work She Had to Accomplish.
At various times I had my concerns about the fact that our daughters' preschool didn't emphasize learning letters, numbers, and sounds. Some neighbors opted to enroll their children in more academic preschools. Our kids stayed, though, and not because we thought our preschool was "the best," or even "better" than others nearby. Our daughters, while different in many ways, have in common that they're hardwired for traditional public school: content to sit still and focus on one activity for relatively long periods. My daughters could benefit from a less structured learning environment in preschool. In a similar setting, we can appreciate that different children might be bored or stressed. The key is understanding the needs of your own child.
Race to Nowhere suggests that our current system of schooling, with its perceived emphasis on test scores, GPAs, athletic scholarships, competitions, and college acceptances, is sapping the souls of our students and we've got to fix it. But many of us educators and/or parents derived a common conclusion from the film: what's most important in navigating the stresses of school is knowing your own child, and how his strengths and challenges will be enriched or exacerbated by choices you help him make. The more that schooling is viewed as an individualized journey advancing each student's unique interests and goals, the less it can be characterized as a "race." If winning is getting into Harvard, most of us are going to lose. If winning is developing into self-sustaining, contributing, and satisfied members of society, most of us can win. Redefining achievement and success in our culture has to be part of the dialogue. And families can begin with how they talk to their children.
A mother in the film acknowledges that "even though we know better, we push (our children). I want them to have choices." Choices aren't a prize at the end of teenagehood; children should be guided in making wise and meaningful choices for themselves all along. Tiger Mom Amy Chua's children are likely to have the choices of "top" colleges--she has pushed them to excel academically and musically--but they aren't permitted to choose their own extracurricular activities nor an instrument besides piano or violin to practice. There's got to be a happy medium between allowing one's child to choose to do nothing and prescribing one's child's interests--and scheduling his time--for him. Knowing your child means understanding if you are parent to a child who pushes himself (even too hard) or to a child who needs encouragement to stretch himself. You adjust accordingly, for the sake of your individual child's health and well being.
It has occurred to me, as I cook dinner and set the table while my daughter does her homework, that we might shift the focus of our pushing and pressure to our children's acquisition of independent living skills, and spend more time teaching them to make a meal, assume responsibility for their belongings and environment, and interact politely and assertively with others.
As parents we also have to acknowledge that we're the consumers in the system we decry. It's easy to claim we have no choices: "Everyone is playing year-round soccer; if my son doesn't, he won't make the team," "Our daughter has to take an SAT prep course or she can't compete with her peers," and "If we don't start ballet now, she'll never have a career as a dancer..."
Reflexive sign-ups result in students who are overscheduled and overburdened with AP courses and activities that may be inappropriate for them, or just...pointless. When the passion for soccer wanes, when the SAT scores don't rise, when the ballerina wants to draw pictures at home instead, it's time to reconsider how we're spending our time (and money). The race is to nowhere when a child--and her family--can't meaningfully link who she is with what she's doing and where she's supposedly heading. How sad to look back at hours of time on a soccer field (working with a team, strengthening one's body, negotiating success and failure) and determine it was all a waste if there's no college athletic scholarship awarded. How sad to look back at experiences in advanced high school courses (critically analyzing topics, pushing the limits of one's cognitive skills, negotiating time and demanding studies) and determine it was all a waste if there's no Ivy League college acceptance.
How sad to recall one's former teacher asking, "You did all that work to go to an Ivy League college and all you want to be is a teacher?"
Childhood and its experiences aren't means to an end; they are stages in a human's development. Throughout childhood children develop their abilities to identify and choose meaningful activities and pursuits, manage stress, balance work and play, build skills, advocate for and support themselves, and collaborate and coexist, with the guidance of their families and schools. And therefore we owe it to our children--and this society--to recognize, embrace, and nurture the gifts of individual children and their application to becoming satisfied and self-sufficient adults.
We're surrounded by friends, family members, and neighbors who pursued individual paths and defined success in a variety of ways, but we often forget about them when we dream for and then design traditional routes to success for our own children. As individuals we value the artisans, technicians, inventors, mechanics, chefs, assistants, landscapers, and builders whose work we appreciate and admire. We will value them more as a society when families increasingly validate their children's diverse dreams and schools offer more programs and electives to nurture interests and talents in those areas.
Race to Nowhere focuses in part on a family whose thirteen-year-old daughter ended her life, ostensibly as a result of the pressures of performing in school and a disappointing math grade. When I shared with my seven-year-old that I watched a movie about a girl who hurt herself after she did poorly on a test, my daughter nodded. "I understand, Mommy! When I got 'basic' on a test, I slapped myself in the face." Jaws dropped and my husband and I were stunned for a moment. This will be the first year our daughter takes state tests, and there is pressure on schools and teachers--and, oops, students--to perform. In our family we quickly activated Operation Do Your Best and Do Not Stress. Schools, too, with the support of the state and the media (responsible for reminding us how unfavorably Americans compare to other countries' students), need to put testing in its proper place, and use scores as diagnostic tools to support students needing development of basic skills.
Perspective is what we can offer our children as they navigate the choices and pressures of school and activities. Neither we nor our kids are expected to "do and achieve everything," and if we work under that assumption we ought to take a good luck at who is responsible for setting those expectations: most often, ourselves.
Few of us, I suspect, pursue in adulthood the activities which "got us into" college and our current careers (heck, I'm not even working in the area of my college major). For most of us, those sports and activities have been replaced by joyful pursuits for which we require little recognition: gardening, cooking, photography, travel, reading, writing, sewing, fishing, collecting, entertaining, yoga, hiking. Shouldn't our children have opportunities to invest in activities for which they may not receive "credit" but may achieve personal fulfillment?
Let's teach our children to be who they are, versus enlist them in an army of aspiring varsity athletes and 4.0s. We need club founders and joiners and community volunteers and quiet artists and "average joes" who draw people to them. There have to be times, while our children are safe in our nests but growing their wings, for quitting, for starting over, for failing, for obsessing, for taking risks and time-outs. For dusting off and bouncing back. For taking roads less traveled by or hanging in the slow lane.
Our daughters have both said yes to dance class and no to Little League this spring. We're disappointed; we love balmy evenings at the ball fields. We want our daughters to catch and throw. And there's the possibility of discovering a daughter's innate talent or love for the sport.
But we're listening to them this season. I need to remember to sign them up for dance; for now, we're enjoying the free time.
But the film Race to Nowhere is about more than homework; it argues that "the whole culture needs to revise what is important and what is not." So this week I explore the role of families in helping kids define What Is Important, and how our schools can support healthy options.
Posted on the bulletin board at Little Sis's preschool is an article titled "Want to Get Your Kids into College? Let Them Play." The article's authors, an early childhood teacher and professor of medicine and sociology at Harvard, allude to a study which shows that more opportunities for imaginative play in early childhood (particularly in groups) yield greater chances of success in school and beyond. Make-believe activities support the development of self-regulation, and self-regulating individuals are less likely to drop out, commit crimes, and abuse substances. It turns out that our daughter's preschool, with its multi-age classroom and fairly unstructured curriculum, allows ample opportunity for free playtime.
Big Sis attended this neighborhood preschool too, which I confess we chose primarily for reasons of convenience and because relatives' and friends' children were happily enrolled there too. But on Big Sis's first day of kindergarten, when she placed her backpack over the chair at her tidy new desk, sat quietly on her designated square on the mat, and brought home her first official homework, I was grateful for her preschool in all its free-flowingness. On that first day of kindergarten I could see the remainder of my daughter's life stretching before her, with playtime coming second to All The Important Work She Had to Accomplish.
At various times I had my concerns about the fact that our daughters' preschool didn't emphasize learning letters, numbers, and sounds. Some neighbors opted to enroll their children in more academic preschools. Our kids stayed, though, and not because we thought our preschool was "the best," or even "better" than others nearby. Our daughters, while different in many ways, have in common that they're hardwired for traditional public school: content to sit still and focus on one activity for relatively long periods. My daughters could benefit from a less structured learning environment in preschool. In a similar setting, we can appreciate that different children might be bored or stressed. The key is understanding the needs of your own child.
Race to Nowhere suggests that our current system of schooling, with its perceived emphasis on test scores, GPAs, athletic scholarships, competitions, and college acceptances, is sapping the souls of our students and we've got to fix it. But many of us educators and/or parents derived a common conclusion from the film: what's most important in navigating the stresses of school is knowing your own child, and how his strengths and challenges will be enriched or exacerbated by choices you help him make. The more that schooling is viewed as an individualized journey advancing each student's unique interests and goals, the less it can be characterized as a "race." If winning is getting into Harvard, most of us are going to lose. If winning is developing into self-sustaining, contributing, and satisfied members of society, most of us can win. Redefining achievement and success in our culture has to be part of the dialogue. And families can begin with how they talk to their children.
A mother in the film acknowledges that "even though we know better, we push (our children). I want them to have choices." Choices aren't a prize at the end of teenagehood; children should be guided in making wise and meaningful choices for themselves all along. Tiger Mom Amy Chua's children are likely to have the choices of "top" colleges--she has pushed them to excel academically and musically--but they aren't permitted to choose their own extracurricular activities nor an instrument besides piano or violin to practice. There's got to be a happy medium between allowing one's child to choose to do nothing and prescribing one's child's interests--and scheduling his time--for him. Knowing your child means understanding if you are parent to a child who pushes himself (even too hard) or to a child who needs encouragement to stretch himself. You adjust accordingly, for the sake of your individual child's health and well being.
It has occurred to me, as I cook dinner and set the table while my daughter does her homework, that we might shift the focus of our pushing and pressure to our children's acquisition of independent living skills, and spend more time teaching them to make a meal, assume responsibility for their belongings and environment, and interact politely and assertively with others.
As parents we also have to acknowledge that we're the consumers in the system we decry. It's easy to claim we have no choices: "Everyone is playing year-round soccer; if my son doesn't, he won't make the team," "Our daughter has to take an SAT prep course or she can't compete with her peers," and "If we don't start ballet now, she'll never have a career as a dancer..."
Reflexive sign-ups result in students who are overscheduled and overburdened with AP courses and activities that may be inappropriate for them, or just...pointless. When the passion for soccer wanes, when the SAT scores don't rise, when the ballerina wants to draw pictures at home instead, it's time to reconsider how we're spending our time (and money). The race is to nowhere when a child--and her family--can't meaningfully link who she is with what she's doing and where she's supposedly heading. How sad to look back at hours of time on a soccer field (working with a team, strengthening one's body, negotiating success and failure) and determine it was all a waste if there's no college athletic scholarship awarded. How sad to look back at experiences in advanced high school courses (critically analyzing topics, pushing the limits of one's cognitive skills, negotiating time and demanding studies) and determine it was all a waste if there's no Ivy League college acceptance.
How sad to recall one's former teacher asking, "You did all that work to go to an Ivy League college and all you want to be is a teacher?"
Childhood and its experiences aren't means to an end; they are stages in a human's development. Throughout childhood children develop their abilities to identify and choose meaningful activities and pursuits, manage stress, balance work and play, build skills, advocate for and support themselves, and collaborate and coexist, with the guidance of their families and schools. And therefore we owe it to our children--and this society--to recognize, embrace, and nurture the gifts of individual children and their application to becoming satisfied and self-sufficient adults.
We're surrounded by friends, family members, and neighbors who pursued individual paths and defined success in a variety of ways, but we often forget about them when we dream for and then design traditional routes to success for our own children. As individuals we value the artisans, technicians, inventors, mechanics, chefs, assistants, landscapers, and builders whose work we appreciate and admire. We will value them more as a society when families increasingly validate their children's diverse dreams and schools offer more programs and electives to nurture interests and talents in those areas.
Race to Nowhere focuses in part on a family whose thirteen-year-old daughter ended her life, ostensibly as a result of the pressures of performing in school and a disappointing math grade. When I shared with my seven-year-old that I watched a movie about a girl who hurt herself after she did poorly on a test, my daughter nodded. "I understand, Mommy! When I got 'basic' on a test, I slapped myself in the face." Jaws dropped and my husband and I were stunned for a moment. This will be the first year our daughter takes state tests, and there is pressure on schools and teachers--and, oops, students--to perform. In our family we quickly activated Operation Do Your Best and Do Not Stress. Schools, too, with the support of the state and the media (responsible for reminding us how unfavorably Americans compare to other countries' students), need to put testing in its proper place, and use scores as diagnostic tools to support students needing development of basic skills.
Perspective is what we can offer our children as they navigate the choices and pressures of school and activities. Neither we nor our kids are expected to "do and achieve everything," and if we work under that assumption we ought to take a good luck at who is responsible for setting those expectations: most often, ourselves.
Few of us, I suspect, pursue in adulthood the activities which "got us into" college and our current careers (heck, I'm not even working in the area of my college major). For most of us, those sports and activities have been replaced by joyful pursuits for which we require little recognition: gardening, cooking, photography, travel, reading, writing, sewing, fishing, collecting, entertaining, yoga, hiking. Shouldn't our children have opportunities to invest in activities for which they may not receive "credit" but may achieve personal fulfillment?
Let's teach our children to be who they are, versus enlist them in an army of aspiring varsity athletes and 4.0s. We need club founders and joiners and community volunteers and quiet artists and "average joes" who draw people to them. There have to be times, while our children are safe in our nests but growing their wings, for quitting, for starting over, for failing, for obsessing, for taking risks and time-outs. For dusting off and bouncing back. For taking roads less traveled by or hanging in the slow lane.
Our daughters have both said yes to dance class and no to Little League this spring. We're disappointed; we love balmy evenings at the ball fields. We want our daughters to catch and throw. And there's the possibility of discovering a daughter's innate talent or love for the sport.
But we're listening to them this season. I need to remember to sign them up for dance; for now, we're enjoying the free time.
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Homework: Not a Failing Grade
There I am in the 2004 Yearbook, posing beside the AP Chemistry teacher on the "Staff Standout" page above the caption "Most Likely to Give Homework Due After a Break."
Guilty as charged. I was teaching AP and IB Literature to high school seniors and often assigned reading over holidays. I wasn't dismayed by the student-determined distinction; I felt secure in my relationship with students and confident that I was a good--not oppressive!--teacher. I was even voted "Most Helpful" the year prior.
All this was before, of course, I became a parent of a homework-doer myself. Before I fully understood that for every novel I assigned, a number of students were not reading it. Before I became an administrator and spent hours at high school sports matches, performances, and competitions--the same hours my students were spending before they went home to eat dinner and do homework.
My perspective has changed. I've thought about that often over the years since I took this job as vice principal, with its more global view of students' daily lives. It was easier to forget, as my students' English teacher, that my students were also students of math, science, art, history...with teachers who valued their disciplines and their students' investments in them as well.
I wanted my students to love books as I did, to love our discussions about characters, and to love writing, too. In order to love literature, I knew they had to understand it. To understand it they had to know it. To know it they had to read it.
So I required that they read, and they had to read a lot--almost as much as I had to read in college English courses. But this was a college English course, you see: it was an Advanced Placement English Literature course, which earns students a weighted grade and college credit if they pass the end-of-year College Board exams.
And, my students were practicing for college, by not reading every book assigned.
But high school students are not college students. Students in high school traditionally attend all their classes every day and complete daily homework for each course. Colleges generally offer some flexibility in scheduling; students enroll in fewer classes which meet less often than students are accustomed to in high school.
The daily grind of high school, overscheduling of children, and competition for college--along with parents and schools who are perceived as promoting and perpetuating these problems--are the subjects of recent dialogue. "Tiger Mom" Amy Chua, profiled in The Wall Street Journal's article "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior," has elicited outrage and a slew of responses.
Meanwhile, parent groups brought the documentary film Race to Nowhere to audiences of educators and community members in our city, and it has prompted daily discussions and proposed policy changes in our school district. Whom the film targets in its portrayal of the stresses wearing down our kids depends on the opinion of the viewer. But there's no doubt that homework is cast as an antagonist.
Homework is an easy target. It's a universal enemy, as it represents the tasks imposed on us which we're obligated to perform, in seemingly Sisyphean ritual. Even now, domestic duties--bills, laundry, cooking, dishes, assembling school lunches--loom each evening as forms of parental "homework," enjoyable sometimes, but often inspiring take out and piles of unfolded clothes on the couch.
When I was an English teacher I recall the various ways I both avoided and negotiated the burden of grading homework--by assigning myself nightly apportionments, by dedicating chunks of hours to the red pen on weekends, by doubling up so I could give myself a night off. Under duress, under a serious time crunch, I would render inconsequential a pile of reading questions or vocabulary sentences on occasion. My subsequent guilt reminded me to vow to assign only what I could humanly assess and give credit.
But therein lies the rub. Athletes, musicians, artists, writers, chefs, technicians, scientists all practice their craft for hours in excess of the moments--or performances--on which they are assessed. It's not unreasonable for coaches and teachers to encourage their charges to practice, and to do so without the expectation of points or credit or reward. It's possible that mastery requires more work than a coach or teacher can observe, assess, or comment upon. Therefore it falls upon not only the teacher, but the student and/or parent, to determine when enough is enough.
A senior approached me at lunch today to ask me if I would distribute "homework passes." "To all students?" I asked him. "Yeah..." he nodded. "Or just me...I had a game last night, and then I was tired, and I didn't do my English homework."
"What you need to do is own it; be honest," I suggested. "I pay bills late once in a while. One late bill is no big deal, as long as my other bills are on time. But if I continue to pay them late, my credit score will suffer. Tell your teacher you chose not to do your homework last night, but you'll do it from now on. And then...do it."
He looked at me. "Ms. M, you are no help."
Maybe putting homework in perspective is what we all need to do, in an effort to stem the fear, the drudgery, the shortcuts and copying, the shame, the excuses, and the overemphasis on it. As I've chronicled, homework has the potential to hijack our household, and there are nights we set it aside. But I wouldn't argue for getting rid of it altogether.
Here are my reasons why:
1. Homework connects families to what children are learning at school. If Big Sis didn't have second grade homework, I wouldn't know that there are better methods for adding and subtracting than borrowing and carrying. Observing your child doing homework provides clues about how your learner approaches problems and what your learner finds easy and challenging.
2. Homework reinforces prioritization. There are nights when homework should take a back seat and the consequences of missed points and credit are worthy prices to pay. Having Something You Have to Do, though, around the Things You Want to Do, is simply a function of Real Life. The extent to which one wants one's school--or work--life to infringe upon the rest of one's life becomes one's own discretion. With consequences, of course.
3. Mastery Requires Practice. And learning a topic in depth often requires reading outside class time. We don't eat all our food in restaurants (or the dining hall) (I hope). We eventually have to go out, gather ingredients, mix them up, work it out, hopefully eat. That's real life. We do better when we've had independent practice. It can't all be served up on a platter.
And here are suggestions for more wholesome, healthy (dare I say happy?) homework:
1. Advance Planning. In college, professors hand out syllabi for their courses on the first day of class, with due dates and exams calendared. In elementary school, students often get packets for the entire week. With this kind of information in hand, a student and family can plan ahead and around major events. We enjoy nights of no homework--evenings for dinner out or with friends or for Family Games. Having it all up front and the chance to get ahead helps.
2. Creative Approach, and Choices. One of the functions of homework is to assess mastery. But where practice isn't the purpose, assessing critical thinking skills should be, and inspiration can reign. Not all homework will or should be exciting, but proof that students read the chapter can take many forms, and options for students improve motivation. When I experimented with genres and allowed students to write essays as dialogues between characters, writing literary analyses became more intriguing to students, and grading them more fun for me. Educators must vow to fight fiercely associations with "busywork." As Lily Tomlin said, "I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework."
3. Balance. How much homework is too much depends on many variables, including an individual student's preparation or capacity to tackle the material and how efficiently he/she works. An educator's healthy practice includes reflecting on assessments and their volume, purpose, and necessity. If homework functions, in part, to determine what and who needs more attention in the classroom, then balance means not assigning or grading so much that careful feedback isn't possible.
Parents can do their part by recognizing that a rigorous and challenging curriculum isn't measured by the volume of homework in their children's backpacks. In my AP Literature course we moved through novels at a steady clip that required outside reading, but I acknowledge that I sometimes assigned homework to maintain the daily habit and routine. I recognize now that as a collective team, my colleagues and I were providing students with the discipline of daily homework. As individuals, we shouldn't feel compelled to pile on because of the unspoken expectation of daily homework in every course.
Balance ultimately means putting homework in its place as only one seat at a table reserved for a large party of aspects of a child's education. Schools must continue to determine ways to level the playing field for those students without the benefit of parents who supervise homework or a home environment that fosters learning. Schools can help by providing supports for students who struggle to meet standards, who don't complete homework, and who fail. Teachers can help by continuing to reflect on the value of homework in achieving their courses'--and individual students'--objectives. Parents can help by reinforcing healthy approaches to schooling at home and honest accountability for schoolwork, both finished and incomplete. Students can help by offering teachers respectful feedback on what they find valuable and meaningful, and by acknowledging the role of their own efforts and investment in their education.
Guilty as charged. I was teaching AP and IB Literature to high school seniors and often assigned reading over holidays. I wasn't dismayed by the student-determined distinction; I felt secure in my relationship with students and confident that I was a good--not oppressive!--teacher. I was even voted "Most Helpful" the year prior.
All this was before, of course, I became a parent of a homework-doer myself. Before I fully understood that for every novel I assigned, a number of students were not reading it. Before I became an administrator and spent hours at high school sports matches, performances, and competitions--the same hours my students were spending before they went home to eat dinner and do homework.
My perspective has changed. I've thought about that often over the years since I took this job as vice principal, with its more global view of students' daily lives. It was easier to forget, as my students' English teacher, that my students were also students of math, science, art, history...with teachers who valued their disciplines and their students' investments in them as well.
I wanted my students to love books as I did, to love our discussions about characters, and to love writing, too. In order to love literature, I knew they had to understand it. To understand it they had to know it. To know it they had to read it.
So I required that they read, and they had to read a lot--almost as much as I had to read in college English courses. But this was a college English course, you see: it was an Advanced Placement English Literature course, which earns students a weighted grade and college credit if they pass the end-of-year College Board exams.
And, my students were practicing for college, by not reading every book assigned.
But high school students are not college students. Students in high school traditionally attend all their classes every day and complete daily homework for each course. Colleges generally offer some flexibility in scheduling; students enroll in fewer classes which meet less often than students are accustomed to in high school.
The daily grind of high school, overscheduling of children, and competition for college--along with parents and schools who are perceived as promoting and perpetuating these problems--are the subjects of recent dialogue. "Tiger Mom" Amy Chua, profiled in The Wall Street Journal's article "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior," has elicited outrage and a slew of responses.
Meanwhile, parent groups brought the documentary film Race to Nowhere to audiences of educators and community members in our city, and it has prompted daily discussions and proposed policy changes in our school district. Whom the film targets in its portrayal of the stresses wearing down our kids depends on the opinion of the viewer. But there's no doubt that homework is cast as an antagonist.
Homework is an easy target. It's a universal enemy, as it represents the tasks imposed on us which we're obligated to perform, in seemingly Sisyphean ritual. Even now, domestic duties--bills, laundry, cooking, dishes, assembling school lunches--loom each evening as forms of parental "homework," enjoyable sometimes, but often inspiring take out and piles of unfolded clothes on the couch.
When I was an English teacher I recall the various ways I both avoided and negotiated the burden of grading homework--by assigning myself nightly apportionments, by dedicating chunks of hours to the red pen on weekends, by doubling up so I could give myself a night off. Under duress, under a serious time crunch, I would render inconsequential a pile of reading questions or vocabulary sentences on occasion. My subsequent guilt reminded me to vow to assign only what I could humanly assess and give credit.
But therein lies the rub. Athletes, musicians, artists, writers, chefs, technicians, scientists all practice their craft for hours in excess of the moments--or performances--on which they are assessed. It's not unreasonable for coaches and teachers to encourage their charges to practice, and to do so without the expectation of points or credit or reward. It's possible that mastery requires more work than a coach or teacher can observe, assess, or comment upon. Therefore it falls upon not only the teacher, but the student and/or parent, to determine when enough is enough.
A senior approached me at lunch today to ask me if I would distribute "homework passes." "To all students?" I asked him. "Yeah..." he nodded. "Or just me...I had a game last night, and then I was tired, and I didn't do my English homework."
"What you need to do is own it; be honest," I suggested. "I pay bills late once in a while. One late bill is no big deal, as long as my other bills are on time. But if I continue to pay them late, my credit score will suffer. Tell your teacher you chose not to do your homework last night, but you'll do it from now on. And then...do it."
He looked at me. "Ms. M, you are no help."
Maybe putting homework in perspective is what we all need to do, in an effort to stem the fear, the drudgery, the shortcuts and copying, the shame, the excuses, and the overemphasis on it. As I've chronicled, homework has the potential to hijack our household, and there are nights we set it aside. But I wouldn't argue for getting rid of it altogether.
Here are my reasons why:
1. Homework connects families to what children are learning at school. If Big Sis didn't have second grade homework, I wouldn't know that there are better methods for adding and subtracting than borrowing and carrying. Observing your child doing homework provides clues about how your learner approaches problems and what your learner finds easy and challenging.
2. Homework reinforces prioritization. There are nights when homework should take a back seat and the consequences of missed points and credit are worthy prices to pay. Having Something You Have to Do, though, around the Things You Want to Do, is simply a function of Real Life. The extent to which one wants one's school--or work--life to infringe upon the rest of one's life becomes one's own discretion. With consequences, of course.
3. Mastery Requires Practice. And learning a topic in depth often requires reading outside class time. We don't eat all our food in restaurants (or the dining hall) (I hope). We eventually have to go out, gather ingredients, mix them up, work it out, hopefully eat. That's real life. We do better when we've had independent practice. It can't all be served up on a platter.
And here are suggestions for more wholesome, healthy (dare I say happy?) homework:
1. Advance Planning. In college, professors hand out syllabi for their courses on the first day of class, with due dates and exams calendared. In elementary school, students often get packets for the entire week. With this kind of information in hand, a student and family can plan ahead and around major events. We enjoy nights of no homework--evenings for dinner out or with friends or for Family Games. Having it all up front and the chance to get ahead helps.
2. Creative Approach, and Choices. One of the functions of homework is to assess mastery. But where practice isn't the purpose, assessing critical thinking skills should be, and inspiration can reign. Not all homework will or should be exciting, but proof that students read the chapter can take many forms, and options for students improve motivation. When I experimented with genres and allowed students to write essays as dialogues between characters, writing literary analyses became more intriguing to students, and grading them more fun for me. Educators must vow to fight fiercely associations with "busywork." As Lily Tomlin said, "I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework."
3. Balance. How much homework is too much depends on many variables, including an individual student's preparation or capacity to tackle the material and how efficiently he/she works. An educator's healthy practice includes reflecting on assessments and their volume, purpose, and necessity. If homework functions, in part, to determine what and who needs more attention in the classroom, then balance means not assigning or grading so much that careful feedback isn't possible.
Parents can do their part by recognizing that a rigorous and challenging curriculum isn't measured by the volume of homework in their children's backpacks. In my AP Literature course we moved through novels at a steady clip that required outside reading, but I acknowledge that I sometimes assigned homework to maintain the daily habit and routine. I recognize now that as a collective team, my colleagues and I were providing students with the discipline of daily homework. As individuals, we shouldn't feel compelled to pile on because of the unspoken expectation of daily homework in every course.
Balance ultimately means putting homework in its place as only one seat at a table reserved for a large party of aspects of a child's education. Schools must continue to determine ways to level the playing field for those students without the benefit of parents who supervise homework or a home environment that fosters learning. Schools can help by providing supports for students who struggle to meet standards, who don't complete homework, and who fail. Teachers can help by continuing to reflect on the value of homework in achieving their courses'--and individual students'--objectives. Parents can help by reinforcing healthy approaches to schooling at home and honest accountability for schoolwork, both finished and incomplete. Students can help by offering teachers respectful feedback on what they find valuable and meaningful, and by acknowledging the role of their own efforts and investment in their education.
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