I would like to start this post with an anecdote:
NYU currently has some of their students do about 80 hours of observation at summer schools before starting student teaching.
During “observation” many NYU students help teachers by doing tutoring or group work. I observed at LoMa (Lower Manhattan Arts Academy) a struggling school usually housed in a building on the Lower East Side. But, because of building renovations they were at a different school for the summer along with two other schools. On my first day observing one of the administrators told me that, “nobody works summer school unless they really need the money.” I was escorted to a large
classroom half filled with slumping students, mostly boys and mostly students of color. In front of the classroom was a scared looking white lady. I took a seat at the back. Most kids had Sidekicks or PSPs and were completely disregarding the lesson on vocabulary. As the class progressed, there room swelled to over fifty students, meandering in and out. Speaking to the students around me, I realized that there were 9th-12th graders, all who have failed, either English class, the English regents or both. The air-conditioning was on but the body heat pushed the temperature of the room well above eighty. I later learned that the teacher at the front was a teaching fellow, fresh out of a five-week cram session on Education, and what I had been witnessing was her first day of work. I spent the rest of the summer helping an extremely nice yoga/P.E. teacher help kids cram for the global regents, something neither of us knew anything about.
That first day was the biggest reality check ever. I also tutored some kids that summer, and realized how far below grade level most of the kids are. I think the most difficult thing for me this semester, teaching at one of the better, more organized middle schools, is the fact that these kids have so much to navigate. I know this sounds cliché, but many of my students don’t have home environments conducive to succeeding in school. I know kids who have been shot, live in shelters, and whose entire family (Mom, Dad, and two siblings) live in one room and sleep in one bed. I have many students who have pregnant siblings, and some who care for nieces, nephews, brothers and sisters. Their lives are complicated. We are constantly warned about lowering our expectations for urban kids, which I try very hard not to do. But how much is lowered expectations and how much is understanding that life is full and rich, and school is only a small modicum of life for these students.
I am just a Student teacher, and I am debating whether I want to teach in an urban setting next year. I would get paid less,
work more hours, have more students, and larger class size. Often, the administration seems more burnt out than the teachers.
At the school I’m at now, they seem to run the school more like a business with little employees than a place for growth,
experimentation, and learning,
Honestly, what I would need first and foremost to teach in an urban setting next year small class sizes, and not too many
students. Secondly, I would need to find a school that has a similar teaching philosophy to mine, that allows and expects
creative exploration. Thirdly, if I was going to teach in NYC I would want to make enough money so I could live near where I
worked, which would be fiscally impossible on today’s teaching salaries. Let me just say, I love my students. And I love the excitement and the energy that come into class with everyday. And, despite everything that I just said, I don’t know if I am willing to give that up for a job that might be a little easier. Who goes into teaching because its easy?
To the NYC Chalkboard
5 comments:
"I know this sounds cliché, but many of my students don’t have home environments conducive to succeeding in school. I know kids who have been shot, live in shelters, and whose entire family (Mom, Dad, and two siblings) live in one room and sleep in one bed. I have many students who have pregnant siblings, and some who care for nieces, nephews, brothers and sisters. Their lives are complicated. We are constantly warned about lowering our expectations for urban kids, which I try very hard not to do. But how much is lowered expectations and how much is understanding that life is full and rich, and school is only a small modicum of life for these students."
MMM. Exactly. Oh, this is so hard and something I struggle with just working with my afterschool programs and kids. I love my kids. I love love love them and I see SO much potential in them. I want to squeeze it out like toothpaste. I want them to see what shines within them. I want my second-graders to stop telling me that they're not good enough and that they can't do this. I don't want to ever hear another one of my kids say "I don't want to be a somebody, I want to be a nobody!" But my kids even at 2nd-grade are BURNT OUT. Anna, my little girl who wishes to be a nobody, tells me of such cramped and loud night-time conditions in their apartment that she hardly ever gets enough sleep. She's very sleepy and cranky afterschool and sometimes I just want to take her over to a corner and have a little cookies and milk and naptime session. But I could never do that. . . and that's not what's best for her in the long run. But it's this short term vs. long term thing. . . what's best for the children? How far is too far to push?
I work with middle school students doing an Art/Mural enrichment club. My own personal philosophy about art is that art is more than just beauty: art is enlightment. I'm all about art for literacy, art for knowledge, blah blah. . . I had a group of kids last quarter that worked really well together and with me. They came up with ideas for this GREAT beautiful mural about technology. It reads like a visual essay, tells a story, and is something they and I are VERY proud of. I'm having a harder time with my kids this quarter. . . a lot of them have behavior issues, which I don't get too much background info on (yesterday I was told that one of my girls has "suicidal and lesbian tendencies" -- I don't even know what that's supposed to mean) and they just want to fingerpaint the whole hour and a half. Most of my 6th-8th graders were making pools of paint and were very caught up in making "splash paintings" instead of designing a collective mural on the theme we agreed upon (environmentalism). I was pretty disappointed and unfortunately I think it showed. . .
But I don't know what to do. My kids are BURNT OUT. Do I have the right to push them further? I feel like it's my duty to do so, that to do anything less is selling them short, but I don't know, I don't know. Sometimes I just want to set up nap time. Sometimes I want to do a giant splatterpainting with my kids and screw planning and coexisting with the administration. I don't know how far to push. I want to have high expectations, but everyone tells me I need to lower them. But something in my gut just tells me NO! Arghh, things are frustrating.
Thank you so much for sharing about your student teaching experiences. . . they have really helped me reflect about my own experiences working with urban students. Keep up the great work :)
-- Janel Glinski '08
I think everything you just wrote about with weighing the pros and cons of teaching in an urban setting are all questions we are asking right now too, but without any/much practical experience. Right now, I volunteer at Northampton High which is certainly an easier school to work at than the one you were describing and even then I have students who are dealing with suicidal parents, raising their siblings, brothers being shot, etc. In ways, it pushes me toward larger cities to want to help where its needed the most, but I certainly agree that its a very scary decision to have to make. Its also, as you clearly described, so hard to decide what is lowering standards and what is respecting their outside lives. I constantly battle with myself on such simple events- do I challenge them and push them or do I aide them? And I suppose, I always find myself doing both. Thank you for such a reflective piece. It speaks to me so clearly.
I agree with you about all of your thinking about the pros and cons of teaching in an urban school.
I love student teaching at the campus school and in my own way I guess I have made a difference but there are only 20 students in my class. I imagine I could be of so much more use and make more of a difference in an urban classroom. Student teaching at a place like the campus school has been challenging in itself.
I really appreciate your comment that no one goes into teaching because it is easy. Teachers seem to thrive on continually trying to improve and do things in a new and creative way to better reach their students.
I understand your frustration (or perhaps cannot even begin to understand it). I do a little student teaching on Fridays in Springfield, and it is difficult to get past the emotional scars that some kids come to school with. How do you get to know kids and educate them if you don't know their story? Is that lowering expectations by taking time off to do that, to understand the person behind the grade? I don't want to pry, but when a girl comes into class with a permanent, iron-shaped scar on her arm (with only a brief, embarrassed explanation that her burn was an accident of her mother's) how do you get over their traumas and teach?
Also, your comments on being a racial minority and not wanting to assert yourself in an offensive way really spoke to me. It sounds like you are putting your heart and soul into this, and, while this may sound like false hope, I think it can and will pay off.
-Lucy White
I think you make a wonderful point regarding expectations of students in urban schools. Of course low-income students should be held to high academic standards. But how can a fifteen year old kid be expected to successfully complete their homework when they have no heat, no food, and no roof over their head? How can teachers and administrators be considerate and understanding of the immense loads these teens have to carry? How do you continue to uphold academic standards when students are dealing with so many socioeconomic, familiy, and behavioral issues outside of the classroom? How can teachers and administrators find the balance?
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