Zen and the Art of the Research Paper

One of the most dreaded and misunderstood elements of the high school experience is the research paper process. On a daily basis, I encounter adults who refer to that time in their lives with only a shudder and a dismissal like, “I always hated doing research. I never understood what I was supposed to do.”
I used to feel the same way. The research paper process can be intimidating, mostly because of the size of the task. When you first hand out a research paper assignment, don’t be surprised if your explanation is drowned by the chorus of protests and groans. Students will be eager to tell you (often loudly and all at once) that know only two things about this process: 1) They don’t know anything at all 2) It’s pretty much their entire 9 weeks grade. Actually, it’s more like this: 1) “Miz Savage! I don’t know nothing about no research paper!” 2) “Is you sayin this is gonna be our entire nine week’s grade? I aint gonna pass this semester!” Heartwarming, isn’t it? At this point, panic ensues. Everyone is certain that they can’t do this and they will fail: their fate is sealed. Nobody likes to be imminently threatened with failure. When anxieties occur for students on such a large scale, their immediate reaction is to not do any work at all. This is usually because they don’t know how to do the work. Paradoxically, they’re afraid to ask questions and afraid to do it the wrong way. If they don’t try, they can’t fail, right? Wrong, of course! Students who panic will often disappear for days at a time, missing the very the material they needed to know, making it nearly impossible for themselves to catch up. So what to do?
“I don’t do research papers,” a teacher recently told me, “it’s just too unpleasant.” Personally, I couldn’t disagree more. Research papers are easy, provided you take them one step at a time.

The problem with research papers isn’t that they’re too difficult to do, or that they’re too difficult to learn. The research paper isn’t one impossible task, nor is it the mastery of one objective. The final research paper represents many simple tasks performed in the proper order, with none left out. Basically, students must master one objective before they can move on to the next with any hope of success. Instead of looking at the big picture, students need to tackle one objective at a time. The problem with research papers is that they’re not taught using the proper strategy. Like any enormous, seemingly insurmountable task (see: portfolio) something as daunting as a research paper has to be taken one step at a time. One simple objective (citing a source) flows naturally into the next (creating a works cited page), and before you know it, progress is being made. Just don’t look at the big picture too much. Let them be pleasantly surprised when, all of a sudden, they realize how simply and elegantly it all fits together.
Seems simple, doesn’t it? The trick is in the implementation: the teacher must set simple, short-term goals for the students. Day one: select a topic, do some preliminary research. Doable, right? Day two: Come up with a research question (something you want to know about your topic). Do a little more preliminary research, now looking for the answer to your question. By the end of the class period, have an answer to your question, and four pieces of evidence supporting your answer/four reasons why your answer is true. Day three: The answer is your thesis, and the reasons are your plan of development. Put that aside somewhere safe. Your thesis and plan of development may change over time, and that’s okay. Lesson on taking note-cards—adding a source to your works cited page, lettering your source, lettering your note-cards, and using simple paraphrased or quoted words or sentences to convey ideas. Practice as a class. Independent practice: compile 10 note-cards off of at least 2 different sources that have to do with the background of your topic…..etc, etc. You get the picture. The great thing about the research paper process is that it’s 90% independent practice, which gives you a chance to walk around the room helping out all those kids who get frustrated. That one-on-one time with students, for me, is a big part of what teaching is all about. Those personal interactions with students are the times that mean the most to them, and they really respond well to just a shred of personal attention thrown their way. Truly, the students are all alike: they just want to be loved, and if you can show them that, they’re yours, forever.

Students and teachers alike freak out about the research paper process. That’s a shame, because learning to write a research paper properly is one of the most important skills a high school student can learn. It’s so simple, though, really, so long as you employ this simple strategy. Don’t get caught up in the bigger picture. Don’t just give the assignment and then expect it to get done. Have a concrete, reachable goal set for your students every day. This will keep you honest, as well—you need to be constantly assessing their work to make sure that they’re on the right track. If you don’t correct someone who is headed in the wrong direction right away, they’ll have a miserable final product. Remember, many of these students couldn’t successfully complete a five-paragraph essay if you weren’t holding their hand. Luckily, it’s just as simple as I say it is. It’s just a matter of learning to relax and taking it one step at a time. Have at least one major grade due a week: Thesis and plan of development, works cited page, note cards, outline, rough draft, and final draft. These grades are frequent and serve as good check-ins with students’ progress. Make these grades worth an equal number of points, if you’d like. This places emphasis on the process, which is an important concept for students to grasp. There is no perfect, magical final product materializing out of thin air. There is a process, there are steps, and yes, it’s a lot of hard work, but ultimately, at the end of it all, it’s quite an accomplishment. It’s something to be proud of, something I’ve seen students beaming over as they handed their work to me. That feeling of accomplishment is so valuable to student growth. It’s the moment they realize that there is some consistency in life, that there are no short cuts, that hard work always pays out in the end.

I’ve taught four in-depth research papers in the past two years, and I can say with confidence that I’m unstoppable. Yet I, too, hated the research paper process when I first encountered it as a freshman in high school. Perhaps that’s what inspired me. I also think that learning these skills—not simply the computer skills, or the researching skills, or the writing skills, or any of the other countless and wonderful benchmarks on the state frameworks that this assignment will hit without even breaking a sweat—is essential. Or maybe skills isn’t the right word. Maybe it’s values. I think that, deep down, I believe that assigning research papers is like asking kids to eat their vegetables. They don’t want to, they hate it (or they think they hate it, how do they know, if they won’t even try it?), and it’s very, very good for them. Research papers teach us the value of hard work. They show us that organization makes life a whole lot easier, that neatness is important, that plagiarism is immoral, that structure creates order out of chaos, and that we can use our ideas to create logical, fact based arguments. When we do that, we sound a whole lot more grown-up and persuasive. Most importantly, research papers teach us that, yes, we can accomplish anything we set our minds to, but not in any old way. The process is just as important as the final result. We must break enormous tasks into small ones, which we accomplish methodically, not skipping or botching any one task, understanding each as part of a whole, paying attention to the quality of our work. Ideally, a successfully completed research paper will make a student feel a whole lot more confident and empowered, because it makes sense. Whether a student plans to go on to college or drop out of high school, they’ve benefited from your successfully implemented research paper unit. Among countless valuable lessons, it teaches them this: Set big goals for yourself; dream big. Then get there one step at a time.

What I learned in Teacher Corps (Is this REALLY for a grade?)

I ought to be protesting this compulsory blog thing, but I guess I'm not, because hear I am typing on a Sunday morning. May God have mercy on my soul. Here's the speech I wrote for our presentations. I don't think it's very good.

On second thought, I could talk about other changes I went through during Teacher Corps. I started taking vitamins, for example. I tore my miniscus (sp) and gained twenty pounds. I got knee surgery and lost thirty.

I found the love of my life, the man I'm going to marry.

I quit smoking.

I got screwed by Planter's Bank, and then by U.S. Bank, and learned I should find a Teacher's Credit Union as soon as possible.

I got ringworm. I read Rising Tide. I sat on the porch. I went to Club Ebony.

I ate barbeque. I became a connesuer, even.

On second thought, here's the speech:

A binder. I think this format, although justifiably unpopular, fits well with the theme of my professional development-- order and discipline. These are two things that I'm known for maintaining in the classroom, but I consider that accomplishment to be nothing as compared with the cultivation of these qualities within myself. I wasn't always the paragon of virtue and professionalism that you see standing before you today. I've changed, though-- changed for the better. I learned order and discipline while I was in Teacher Corps.

I don't know when I got tired of being a rebel; it was probably the instant I realized that it takes more courage to be an adult, to participate in the struggle on the side of right. Sullen criticism of the establishment, no matter how apt, is impotent if the speaker is on the sidelines. Anarchy is simply wasted energy. Throwing a brick through the window of a Starbucks, for example, does not directly impact the WTO. Agitation is not the same thing as movement in the right direction. It is only the latter that requires organization and perserverance. it is only through cultivating order and discipline within myself that I am able to arrive at a position where I can participate in the discussion; where I can effect, not immediate, dramatic change, but lasting, far reaching, and sustainable development.

We are only here for a brief time, and no one can say where we're headed. It's important that we use our time here well. During my time with teacher corps, I have realized the importance, nay, the neccessity, of a life-long commitment to serving the underserved.

Next year, I will be teaching young women of privelege at the Academy of the Sacred Heart on St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans. I feel conflicted over this, but I would like to use the experience as an opportunity to cutlivate thoughtful, service-oriented young women. I'd like to begin an intercultural diaglogue of sorts, perhaps in the form of an after-school tutoring program, with the local underserved public school. Ultimately, I plan on returning to the Delta in order to renew my commitment to serving the black community there, preferably in a leadership capacity. I hear many people don't want to live in the Delta, but I wonder if those people have ever been. I can see myself spending the rest of my life there.

I don't think I'd have been capable of surviving in this field if I hadn't cultivated a certain level of order to my existence. Losing one second of instructional time is unacceptable, particularly in an environment where losing a second might mean losing the class. In order to survive, I've become organized, which is entirely against my nature. I've developed systems-- nothing is ever lost or misplaced, everything is easily accessible and on-hand. This is essential. I beleive the most important aspect of classroom management is organization. It facilitates everything else: execution of the lesson, time management, behavior management, everything. The students are active participants in maintianing order in the classroom. They have to be; it's entirely too much work to do on one's own. Besides, for some reason, students love to file. I teach my students organization, too, although they rebel against it. I grade their binders. I hold them accountable. A disorganized binder recieves a failing grade. I would rather that they learn organization than Macbeth. Organization is a life skill.

I can't affort to be sloppy, careless, or disorganized in my classroom; neither can I afford to be so in my existence. Time is of the essence. I have things I need to accomplish before my time is up. I can't afford to waste one second to disorder or confusion. To do so would be weak, even unethical.

Perhaps my greatest accomplishment as an instructor was the execution of four formal MLA-style research papers-- two each year in every class. This was an enormous challenge, considering the fact that in August, most students couldn't successfully execute a five paragraph essay. I teach 12th grade (I have more detailed information on the research paper process, however, I'll post it as a seperate blog so as not to overwhelm the reader).

What seems impossible is simply a challenge to be met-- logically, step by step, one obstacle at a time. It's important, always, to remember the necessity of self-discipline. I think of this, in a large part, as growing up-- realizing the direct connection between action and consequence, between method and result.

To sum it up, Teacher Corps is where I finally became an adult in anything more than name. To know what is important to me, to set a goal, to ultimately create a meaningful and significant positive impact-- this is what will justify my existence on this planet, this is what makes my life worth living, this is what I can accomplish, now that I have learned order and discipline. For me, a life ruled by ego and unmitigated by compassion would be a waste of time.


Okay, I admit, not the best speech. Plus my blog is 40 minutes late, so I won't get credit for it. I'll post it anyway.

spare the rod

You can never tell how a day is going to go. Most often, the days I dread are the ones that go swimmingly: the day after break, for example. I imagine many of the students were grateful to be back-- they seemed hungry for the work, and I spent most of the day blissfull, the silence broken only by the scratches of writing utensils on paper. I can only imagine what their Christmases were like, that they come back with such a willingness to work. On days like this, I feel like the best teacher in the world-- flawless transitions, hitting em out of the park. Yet despite planning, good days and bad are often unpredictable, and the only trend I've noted is that they generally alternate; knock on wood. This morning a puppy wandered into my room. The students were all a little afraid of it, as students will be if they grow up around dogs who are dangerous because they are abused. Think of it-- in Africa, they thought I was magic because my dog would follow me closely and obey my commands. It wasn't understood that this was simply because I fed Rufus and gave him attention instead of beating him and feeding him whiskey. This paddling is stupid. It's barbaric, it's ineffective, it's lazy, and it's damaging to children. Violence begets violence. It's not the physical pain I object to. It's the idea that hitting somebody never solved anything. Nobody ever learned a lesson at the end of a paddle. It makes me sad to think of 'grown folk' treating children this way. Dogs, when beaten, become dangerous. What should keep me from the conclusion that children are the same way?

wheat and chaff

Your first year, did you ever think about quitting?

No. What? No. I signed up, didn't I? Maybe I'm unsympathetic but quitting to me seems selfish and weak. There's nothing remmotely appropriate or adult about signing up for something without being fully committed to it. Nodbody said it would always be a vacation. Suck it up.

This weekend, I went to Clinton, MS along with my cross-country team. At 8am Saturday morning I was on a school bus with far too many loud, foulmoulthed, hyped-up, not-stayin-in-their-seats, ungrateful little etc etc. You get the picture. I mean, they're all precious snowflakes and everything but come on. Cross country has been eating my life-- every day has been a 12 or 13 hour work-day. The end of the season is a relief. In my free time, I'm going to start training for a marathon, and I'll still have bucketloads of free time left over. So anyway, when I mentioned my plan to listen to my ipod while on the bus, several friends (in the context of several different conversations, mind you) accused me of being a bad teacher. I don't think anyone actually beleived that I would do something like that. Well, for everyone's information, I did.

I'm accused of being a bad (read: lazy, less holy) teacher mostly by first years, both tfa and mtc, when I mention how I spent the day. I'm accused of being a bad teacher when I don't grade students' papers or when my lesson plan seems too silent-and-working. I'm accused of being a bad teacher when I grade student's work in class, for that matter. I'm accused of being a bad teacher when I do any number of things that are essential to the preservation of order and sanity.

While my cross country team were being loud and obnoxious in the back of the bus, shouting things that would make a Hell's Angel blush, I was staring out the window and singing along to Justin Timberlake's new single. Does that make me a bad teacher? I don't know. This Saturday, I took my cross-country team to State Finals. What did you do?

Wild as the Taliban

I love nine weeks' tests. Perfectly silent, their knotted brows bent over the exam, writing furiously. So peaceful. When not walking around, I'm grading research papers at my podium, looking up and and frowning sternly every so often for good measure, although it's hardly needed.

The research paper, the third I've done as a teacher, was a great experience for me-- they chose community issues, like crack, teen pregnancy, black men in prison, highschool drop outs, lack of male role models in the home-- they came up with their own topics. We did it in MLA format-- the whole deal with the notecards, the outline, rough draft, final draft. Typed. 12 point. Times New Roman. Head your paper properly. No, I do not need a cover page, much less a binder for you to display your work. That seems a little form over content. I would prefer proper citations and a works cited page. Thanks to the rubric, I graded about half of them yesterday. I love the pilot G2 red pens. A satisfying click to them, and the gel means they just roll over the page. Built for speed. Since it's for work, I can just barely justify the expense. I love reading research papers; it's a great way of getting to know them-- I am making a list of the low and high-end kids-- going to start assigning certain remediations certain days, one of which is going to be a getting-into-college club. So much unrecognized genius. Whitney Gabriel, the girl with two first names. So quiet, so clean, always comes early, always sits in the back. I feel so guilty for never recognizing her. She is a shining star-- creative, literate prose. Brilliant use of metaphor. Maybe we can get her in somewhere, provided she doesn't already have a kid. Xavier Harris-- writes on an actual 12th grade level-- I had always pegged for a joker. He's probably just bored-- my sixth period in general, I now realize, needs higher-level stuff, because it's full of high achievers, prone to talking when left unchallenged.

Of course, there are quite a few research papers I haven't received. It's a conundrum: homecoming week (last week) is a classic case of school getting in the way of education, and I had already extended my due date for the research paper. Since there's less accountability this year (last year, you could write them up and depend on immediate and appropriate action), they only show up when they feel like it. It's kind of sad. I said I wouldn't accept research papers past Monday, and I meant it. Now I have kids trying to push their papers at me and I have to shake my head. I'm trying to be consistent, plus, I don't want them to think I'm bluffing all of the time.

The principal told me to overnight suspend all of the kids who were serious discipline problems. I wrote them up, and I turned the list in, updated it, turned it in again...three times. But nothing happened. One of my students told me the students thought I was bluffing. He didn't mean anything by it, but I realized that the administrative inconsistency made me look like an idiot. This seems unfair, and makes me angry. Obviously I'm not going to hold detention (why punish myself?) but I also need to see what happens when I fail a whole bunch of kids this nine weeks. I've got documentation aplenty (all I'd have to do is point to the roll book and the grade book), and the sad thing is, a kid can't really try in my class and fail. When it comes to Fs, I'm not trigger-happy: failing's reserved for the kids who skip class, the kids who don't turn anything in. Last year, very few students failed-- mostly because I could write them up for not turning in their work, they'd go to ISS (aka 'the hole') and they wouldn't get out until the work was done. This year, I figure it's the first nine weeks, and maybe they deserve a wake up call. So they flunk the first nine weeks. As far as what's feasible and what makes sense, it's the only accountability I know.

The immediate classroom management stuff-- keeping it quiet and productive in room 17-- is easy for me, even with this year's changes. I can still control the climate of my classroom, barring homeroom (which we still, inexplicably, hold for one hour a day...God save us. It wouldn't be a problem if I had seniors, but I have sophmores, 32 of them, who generally disregard me. We've tried to give them work for ENG II, but perhaps they need to actually SEE their grades, which is a ton of work for their ENG II teachers, getting it all organized, getting in touch with all of the teachers who hold 10th grade homeroom, getting work to them, taking it up, reorganizing it by class, averaging in ALL THOSE ZEROES...it's strange, it's more work for everybody, and it doesn't make any sense. If my homeroom were made up of my students, I think I could do some interesting things and use that time productively. 32 sophmores, however...the're like aliens to me). I DO have my students under control, behaviorally speaking. But what happens when they just don't do their work? What happens when they just don't show up? I call parents, but for the most part, the ones who are failing are the ones whose parents aren't involved in the first place. God help me when those same parents are banging down my door with report cards in their hands. I have yet to see where the administration will stand on that issue.

Mr. Mc always used to say, "they'll lie to you, they'll lie on you, but they won't lie for you." More than teaching English, it is my job to teach them social responsibility. This job is meaningless unless you love the kids. I do love the kids, which means I owe them that much: my Fs stand, let the administration stand where it may.

On Homework, Part One:

What is an effective strategy to get most of your kids to do their homework? The best solution I've found to the homework conundrum is this: don't assign any. As I re-read that last sentence, I cringe: I can hear inevitable outcry. "We should have higher expectations than that!" Sigh. Okay. But I'm warning you, you're only making life more difficult on yourself. You'll spend all of this time and energy hunting kids down and practically begging them to turn in their work, or you'll receive work that's blatantly plagiarized. This is not a reason to become angry with the students. This situation is a result of conditioning: they've been trained to slack, to copy.
Do you allot a sufficient amount of each class period for independent practice? Your students should have a considerable amount of time each day to complete their work. In the classroom, they have the advantage of your presence: while they work silently, you move around and provide assistance where needed. Additionally, this gives you the opportunity to perform several necessary and pressing 'housekeeping' duties: you have to stay organized or you'll fall apart—put those files back, write that referral, grade and record that late-work before you misplace it. Hold quiet conferences with students who are frequently absent or tardy, who are behind, or who need to work on their behavior. Assign remediation. Find that transparency. If they're not working independently, they're not learning enough. If you're up there talking for 50 minutes, they're barely learning anything. AND you're working too hard. It's a lose-lose situation, trust me. Some of the things you have to do in order to be a good teacher may not seem selfless and noble to you, and they're not. Some of the things you have to do in order to be a good teacher—many, no, most, possibly even all of the things you have to do in order to be a good teacher are practical, and therefore inherently without glamour. Filing papers, writing memos, and recording grades aren't noble acts, but the aim is becoming organized, fair, calm, focused, together, responsible, professional, etc. Ultimately, you must manage your classroom in order to provide yourself with peace of mind (not to mention job security) and your students with effective instruction. You have to have good management in order to be a good teacher: the means aren't particularly selfless or noble, but that shouldn't bother you unless you enjoy feeling like a martyr. Management may seem selfish and ignoble, but the end is the most selfless and noble of all.

On Homework, Part Two:

Now that I've stepped down off of my soapbox, I realize that I didn't really address the question. Fair enough. I will. One last thing on teaching and then I'll move on: I don't want to sound uppity about teaching. That is, teaching is not in of itself an inherently moral act. Good teaching can effect lasting positive change, though, and that is pretty great, and eminently worthwhile. Ultimately, you should teach because you love it, because it makes you happy. The fact that my job has meaning makes all of the difference to me. I don't think I'd feel satisfied doing most jobs, regardless of salary. When I asked myself 'what am I doing?' I'd come up short. When people asked me at cocktail parties, I'd feel a little bit ashamed unless what I were doing made some sort of positive impact on the world around me. I'd be embarrassed to admit that I dedicated most of my life to making money, or even to doing something that I enjoyed for selfish reasons. It seems like a wasted life.
Homework solutions:
1) It's a major grade. Take off 10% a day for each day it's late. Remember, you have points at your fingertips: as many as you want, and only you control them! Points are your magic power. Take advantage of that.
2) It's tomorrow's quiz: if they did the homework, they can use it to answer all of the questions on the quiz (exactly)! If not, they're up a creek without a paddle.
3) Call parents.
4) Write up kids who didn't do it (former policy at Gentry, will only work if it's supported at your school)
5) Line them up, collect it at the door. Word will get around and you'll have a lot of kids scramble to finish before your class. I don't advise this because a) they're more likely to cheat and b) they'll be doing it in someone else's class, which is unfair.
6) Before grading, record who actually turned it in. Be obvious about it. This is because kids will tell you they turned it in later and accuse you of losing it.
7) Call out the names of kids who did not turn it in. This addresses the reason above and makes it more difficult for them to ignore/forget about it.
8) Don't let them make it up unless they have an excused absence. I haven't tried this, but it might be severe enough to be effective. Late work is a pain for you anyway.

If you assign homework, you must take it up for a grade! If you fail to do so or forget, you're being disrespectful to those students who did the work, as well as communicating to the class that it's not necessary for them to do their homework. Do grade these assignments carefully, and catch cheating the first time. Don't let them make up the work and give them a zero on the assignment. Return the assignments promptly and with comments. They will be more likely to do the work if they know that you're actually going to read it. Class work can often fall into the check/check-plus/check-minus (read: faster grading) category. Homework cannot. You must show that you value homework if you want it to be important to them. Again, I strongly discourage you from assigning homework on a regular basis. The kids who don't do the assignment are going to be the kids who need the practice the most.

Archetypical Management Issues

A word to all those who tell me their classroom management troubles, listen to my advice, and then disagree with me: you're free to make your own decisions. You're also wrong. I've been getting a lot of phone calls recently, and I thought I'd adress the three most common problems I come across. Lest any first year become hurt and feel called out, I've spoken to at least THREE from each of the following categories. No joke.

To the workaholic: You should be working smarter, not harder. An unhappy, sleep-deprived teacher is rarely a good one. I know you think that everything you're doing is absolutely necessary. You're wrong. Settle down. No matter how much work you do, there will always be more. Do you really have to take your own roll? File your own papers? Not only is that something a student can do, most enjoy the responsibility. Appoint a class seceratary, and stop wasting your time.
To the 'cool teacher': You will never relive high-school as a popular kid. Stop trying. Coolness is like the Dao, or water-- try to clutch it, and it slips through your fingers. The 'cool teacher' is the lamest of all. You are not a peer: your students don't need another friend. You're doing a disservice to them by depriving them of a role model. What does it matter whether or not a bunch of kids like you? Unless they RESPECT you, you have nothing at all.
To the inflexible: You are not here out of moral duty to the curriculum or the objectives. Jamall doesn't need to know how to graph a line so much as he needs to know how to behave like a responsible human being. It would be great if he could do both, but which is most important? Subject matter is secondary here. You have the opportunity to aid their development as people. If you're planning on holding these kids up to a national academic standard, go ahead and fail them all. No matter that they're only products of the school system and their backgrounds. Just fail them if they don't master the objectives. Anything else would be dishonest, right? Make those kids stay back until they've mastered those objectives. Then, right before they chase you out of town, ask yourself how many people you helped.

We all learn from experience. Quit making it so hard on yourself. Remember it's not as complicated as all that. You're here, presumably, to help the children. Don't lose sight of that.

Meet the new boss...

If asked, most 2nd years would probably tell you that it gets much easier the second time around. This is true, from an instructional/classroom management perspective. No doubt one has a much clearer view of consistency as being essential to enforcement. Still striving towards 100% on that one. The biggest problem for me has been the inferiority of this year to the previous one. With each day that passes, I am watching my school fall apart.
I was always aware of the fact that I was lucky: partially in terms of my schedule (ENG IV all day long) but primarily in terms of my administration. Today I personally witnessed two fairly violent fights. I had kids who, when questioned about numerous tardies, unexcused absences, and failing grades, were completely non-chalant. I asked kids standing outside my door to move it along to homeroom, and was totally ignored. These experiences are totally new to me. I realize I'll fail to garner any sympathy bemoaning a downfall which, in most schools, had already occured. There's something so much worse, I feel, about watching it slowly unravel. Gentry had discipline. Students were held accountable. Now, I write kids up knowing full well that it's unlikely anything will happen. I think fondly of the days of paperwork, when I was held accountable, and they were, too. Fights: multiple suspensions. Tardies: Closed lunch. Though the bars have been removed, campus is feeling increasingly like a prison, and the instruction is suffering as a result. Daily: one hour of homeroom (students not our own). There is no ISS, there is no detention. There are no speeches, and the atmosphere has shifted from one of enforced discipline to one of struggle for survival. Don't send them to the office, don't make them stand outside. Don't expect referalls to go anywhere but the garbage can. Readers may wonder if I balk at conditions others have been suffering. Let me clarify. I'm not concerned about my classroom as far as external management is concerned. If write ups don't work, I'll find other alternatives, and so far, I haven't had any behavioral problems with my own students.
It's the atmosphere that I find so devastating-- the realization that this school could crumble so entirely and at such speed. That's likely true of any organizaton-- without a leader, it implodes.

On the Cool Teacher.

There is no such thing as a cool teacher. Anyone who tries to be is automatically uncool for trying. A good teacher doesn’t care what the students think of him. He isn’t here to be liked or to be popular. This isn’t an opportunity to make up for being unpopular in high school. Wanting to be liked by high-schoolers is pathetic. To all would-be Cool Teachers: why do you want to teach? Is it so that the students can learn something? Do you want to make a difference in these kids’ lives? If you want to have the maximum possible impact, then, for god’s sake, have them working bell to bell. Enforce your rules consistently. Throw out any possibility of them liking you. Give em hell. Realize that if you give them an inch, they[‘ll take a mile.
The students don’t need another friend. They have friends already. You are not their peer. You are not on the same level as them. You are an authority figure, and, as such, your job is to force them to succeed—to do whatever you can to make them produce the work, learn the material, master the objectives. If you’re good at that, I can promise you, they won’t like you at first.
“Aww, Ms. Savage, why we always gotta work up in here?” It’s the sweetest phrase I’ve ever heard as a teacher. To me, that meant that I was successful. And they thought I was too mean at first, and they thought I was too strict, and I was definitely NOT a cool teacher. But they came around, and at the end of the year, I believe they were grateful for the working environment and the responsibility I demanded of them.
The thing is, anyone who cares what high school students think is automatically uncool anyway. I mean, grow up. They‘re just kids. I revel in my dorkyness. It’s the only kind of punk rock there is. I don’t care if they think I’m cool or not. I’m untouchable. Coolness is being so self assured, not caring what people think. Like the Tao, it’s like water. If you try to hold onto it, it will slip through your hands.

One thing I’ll do differently—
Never again will I make up my mind in front of students. Of course, you’ll always be in those situations where you have to think on your feet, but their faith in yhou dictates that you should always seem firm, fearless, and unwavering. I think the worst thing in the world is to answer a student’s question with “I don’t know.” As if you’d never thought of it before. Another terrible thing to do is let them decide (“whichever is fine”) because it makes it appear as though you didn’t take the time to think it through. Better to make a snap decision or, if possible, say you’ll address that question at the end of class.
Another thing with how I appear is just little things—being visibly tired, rolling my eyes at the intercom, grimacing when a student does something terrible, laughing when they do something funny. I’ve really got to remain professional at all times, and sometimes I think I show a little too much of myself. To the students, who see me as an adult, this is a weakness. Like waiting tables, teaching is a lot like acting. The difference is, the acting is nearly the opposite—in waiting tables, you become subservient, obsequious, all smiles, even when you’re running your tail off and you hate the customer’s guts and you know they’ll leave a measly tip anyway. In teaching, it’s the opposite—you have to, at times, rein in the emotions that would surface naturally. The confusion, fear, doubt, fatigue, depression, anger, and sadness—all human emotions that flicker over me no more often than anyone else—must be tightly reigned in and controlled. Instead of granting the customer anything he wants, you push the student where he must go. Instead of working hard in order to be liked, you try your hardest to get work out of them, and it doesn’t make one bit of difference whether they like you or not, so long as they fear and respect you. Okay, that was for shock value. Not really fear, exactly, although that might be what Mc would call it. Respect for your authority, then. As an authority figure, you must show no human frailties. They want so badly to have faith in you. Don’t spoil it by spotlighting your inadequacies.

One thing I did that worked really well—
There were a few times that I was surprised by how well a lesson went—often when I felt underprepared or unsure, like I was flyikng by the seat of my pants. I expected groupwork to be a disaster, for example, and had shied away from it all year. Nevertheless, when Macbeth rolled around, I had no choice but to do what I thought would best enable the students to read the play. I put them in groups of five and instructed them to assign roles. This, of course, killed a lot of time, and I began to wonder what I was ever thinking. N Suprisingly enough, however, they got into it. I walked around the room listening to them read more4 confidently in their small groups then they would ever read in front of the class. It felt great to know that they were doing this themselves, that all I had to do was poush them in the right direction and that they would move forward of their own volition. Some kids realolyl enjoy reading drama, too, and they would fight over parts. That’s not a good thing, but it was encouraging to me that they cared enough to even go that far. ?one or two students affected “British” accents, which I thought was great.
They had all been enocouraged to this by the fact that I had had several “guest actors” come in, friends of mine who had experience e with Shakespeare and were able to read the play with me. I would have preferred to have both guests on the same day so that I didn’t have to read, but. Both were very good and the4 students were totally captivated, especially by a flamboyant thesbian friend of mine who plalyed the drunken porter with a wavery cockney and explained each scene before we played it. We also involved the students in the dinner scene where the ghost of Banquo appears; we moved the desks so they were Lords and they had several lines in the scene. They loved it. Definitely doing that again next year.