dy/dan

Subscribe

Join 30K+ other people in receiving Dan's monthly updates on innovations, ideas, and news in math education.

Christian Is Concerned

By • May 12, 2007 • 11 Comments

This might seem gratuitous. Jeff, Christian, and Chris have been fretting over my work habits and, because they’re smart guys, odds are good some of my new- and preservice teacher readership shares their misunderstanding of exactly what I’m endorsing here.

From Christian (fourth comment down):

Dan, ALL of us as young teachers (passionately attacking the opportunities with fever) proved that we could spend as many hours outside of the classroom (as inside it) prepping and constructing lessons that demonstrated OUR ‘gift of teaching’. Fear and excitement does that to a guy. So does ego. Just like a young varsity coach still believes she/he has to be able to one-up every one of his/her players to prove they ’still got game’, whereas experienced coaches aren’t breaking a sweat or worried about their 4/40 split on the sidelines.

…

The kids get it – you know more than they do.
The kids get it – you love the subject more than they do.
The kids get it – you are able to research and plan and all the rest harder than they can.
The kids get it – you’re the teacher.

…

Imagine back to a recent post-about-a-lesson of yours, for instance, if you had asked the kids to make their own graphing relationship movies (et al) first…maybe you’d do it alongside them…and then watched to see what happened as you ‘both’ learned from the other side along the way. Your expertise/instinct would have been ahead of them, to be sure, but the ‘process’ would have been centered on learning, not on the teacher’s performance or presentation.

If you’ve been reading this blog the same way Christian has, you see my lesson-planning efforts as:

  1. a response to fear
  2. an outcome of excitement
  3. a result of insecurity
  4. sharply focused but pointed in the wrong direction

Two right, anyway.

(more…)

Jeff Is Concerned

By • May 12, 2007 • 11 Comments

Jeff registers his concern over the hours I work and the ethic I keep (third comment down; dunno why the anchors aren’t working):

I’m concerned that you’re going to burn yourself out before you can get in and make the kind of impact that I know you want to. 18 hours on a 45 minute lesson is NUTS, my friend, and though I know you and TMAO are all about the “bring it hard every minute of the day” approach, to which I say: respect. But we’re going to lose you guys to frustration, to exhaustion, to all the side effects of slamming your head into the wall to entertain adolescents who’d much rather be anywhere else, no matter how much they like (or you think they like) you and your class.

To which I say: thanks for the concern. I’d be a dunce to disregard the counsel of anyone who’s been at this longer than I have. Two reasons why your concern is misplaced and one important point of clarification:

(more…)

Oh NOW I get it.

By • May 12, 2007 • 10 Comments

Also: Why Crash Isn’t As Good As You Think It Is

A few weeks ago I posted this diptych, the only intent of which was to illustrate my gripping inability to see left and right from my students’ perspective.

A commenter hinted at a metaphor beneath the surface, one which eluded me until coupla days ago when Christian Long literalized it substantially.

Christian takes Creative Commons to Threat Level Midnight, completely remixing my original point and launching those photos on a faraway journey to School 2.0 land, where one of largest predators is the one-way dynamic between teacher and student. Christian holds my diptych up as an example of this kind of passive learning (he means no offense and none is taken; it’s a selective look at my practice) and asks what the future of learning would look like if similarly put to photographs.

It’s an evenhanded critique of traditional education, so evenhanded, in fact, I have to seize the moment to point out how other School 2.0-ists prop up their agenda by slinging mud at the traditional speaker-audience model.

(more…)

Interviewing For My Job

By • May 9, 2007 • 5 Comments

This whole blogging thing today made otherwise troubling interview questions a matter of breezy recall. Or maybe it was that nine months ago I was interviewing for the same job with the same two people, answering the same set of questions.

This whole “probationary teacher” thing has gotta go, as far as I’m concerned.

Diminishing Returns

By • May 8, 2007 • 4 Comments

Seems the unofficial meme on my blogroll nowadays is Just what would you do for a little more energy? I’m seeing Hail Marys, white flags, and white knuckles everywhere. Here’s mine.

The same results are less exhilarating. Powerful first-semester tricks carry only a fraction of their potency now in the last month of the second. The energy necessary to engage my kids has doubled while my sleep schedule shrinks inversely. Factors are conspiring pretty well against the teacher right now.

So there are the mental stonewalling exercises, the eviction of un-positive thoughts, the conscious elevation of enthusiasm to nigh cheesy levels. There’s vigilance. Lightning must be caught now. What used to be a luxury is now essential.

So I keep my eyes open, fixed open, looking for math anywhere outside our textbook, outside the same openers and lectures and worksheets we’ve been running for nearly 180 days now. The second an idea or strategy occurs to me I write it down or hit speed dial 3 and have Jott e-mail it to me. I can’t risk forgetting anything fun at this point.

Eyes open. Even during The Office last Thursday, eyes open.

Like during the cold open, when Dwight hands Jim a demerit. Jim knows Dwight is just posturing and presses him on the details. In all his usual unctuousness, Dwight says (paraphrased and compressed):

You do not want to receive three of those. Three demerits and you’ll receive a citation. Five citations and you’re looking at a violation. Four of those and you’ll receive a verbal warning. Keep it up and you’re looking at a written warning. Two of those … that’ll land you in a world of hurt … in the form of a disciplinary review written up by me and placed on the desk of my immediate superior.

So I played the clip and gave today’s lead-off question: “If Jim is late once a week, how long until he receives that disciplinary review?” I realize it isn’t much but I’m just sucking for air, trying to catch a couple of good breaks per period per day, and realizing it’s far easier blogged about than done.

Unless otherwise noted, everything you and I post here is licensed
for reuse under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International.