Courtney Langton
Courtney is an aspiring high school teacher.
Her teachables are History and English, but she's happy to teach anything that doesn't involve numbers or formulas.
Her particular interest is in promoting gender equity and anti-oppression both in and outside the classroom.
She writes a detailed To-Do list every morning, and enjoys nothing more than a good book and a plate of bacon on a rainy Saturday.
Jonathan Wong
LINKS: Blogger
Canadian Chalkboard
Coffee, Calculations and Colombia!
Mewlings
Progressively Unnecessary
TeacHer Finance
It's Not All Flowers and Sausages
So You Want To Teach?
Classroom Confessions
Teach Hub
Web English Teacher
Blogging the Renaissance
ARCHIVES: June 2009 July 2009 August 2009 September 2009 October 2009 November 2009 December 2009 January 2010 March 2010
Being in a class has sapped my originality so you'll have to bear with the title. Nonetheless, I thought I'd update and mention that my prac was generally pretty awesome but more than that, this past week has been one of the more rewarding weeks of prac I've had this entire year. Labels: extra-curriculars, going above and beyond, idealism, music, our job is awesome, practicum, relating to students
I remember going into this third block thinking that being in the music department for the entire time might kill me. But it turned out that apparently, I am musically competent! This was a somewhat interesting discovery. The more interesting discovery, however, came in the form of me realizing that as a music teacher, you form a different kind of bond with your students. Part of it might have to do with the fact that music students tend to like music so your students generally enjoy being in class every day. But a part of it also had to do with this feeling of collaboration that you sometimes don't get when you're teaching other subjects.
But the real reason why I wanted to blog about my music prac is because of the particular phenomenon that turned my prac from being "pretty good" to "awesome".
See, because my associate teacher runs a junior jazz band, junior concert band, senior jazz band, and senior concert band, all during lunch and after school, he only teaches 2 periods a day. So what ended up happening was that we'd have period 1 and 4 to prep, but we'd also have to conduct during lunch and every day after school. Busy life. In the end, though, the "extra" prep period produced an unforeseen side effect.
Music kids, as a rule, dawdle after class. To the point where Mr. Walker and I had to chase them out sometimes. However, the students who had fourth period spare (it was a grade 11/12 band class) were never really in a hurry to leave. Well, it just so happened that last Friday, two such students lingered for longer than usual so I started talking to them about their futures (their plans for next year, what they wanted from life, etc). They ended up staying for about half of fourth period. No big deal, right? Happens from time to time...
Except that this week, they started hanging around on an everyday basis. Then, they were joined by more students (a number of whom I'm pretty sure did NOT have fourth period off). Long story short, by the time Thursday rolled around, what happened was that the bell would ring, these students would put their instruments away, and then stand around, looking at me expectantly like I was supposed to pull a rabbit out of my hat. In essence, for this last week, I spent at least half of my fourth period prep time conducting a "character development" seminar. Rewarding for me, rewarding for them, win-win situation (aside from the marking that I would be obliged to put off).
My final words of advice to them today:
"Try hard, do good, and remember that God is in the details."
It's been awhile since we've posted. I know, that's sorta how we preface every post. We're really sorry. But the good news is that we haven't posted because there's been such a comical amount of stuff happening that's kept us constantly busy and bewildered as we enter the "Job Hunt" phase of our year. Labels: anxiety, big questions, job hunt, teaching abroad
You see, for the first semester of Education, we were all told to focus on doing well on prac and to leave the worrying about the future until second semester. Well, second semester has officially arrived and with it, said worrying. We had a special day last week that involved a slew of school boards coming to Queen's and telling us that there were no jobs. Basically. From what I was able to absorb, the day was primarily centered around 4 things:
1. Applying to the Ontario College of Teachers
Basically, this involves paying hundreds (yes, hundreds) of dollars after we graduate in order to be granted a certificate by the OCT just to be allowed to apply for teaching jobs that don't exist.
2. There are no jobs in Ontario
See Above. Every school board presentation I went to informed me that my chances of getting a job in that particular school board were bad to even worse. Some boards like York Region tried to make us feel better about the fact that only 30% of us will get hired. Other boards tried to make us feel worse.
3. There are plenty of jobs if you're willing to work overseas
Ontario seems to have a mysterious abundance of teachers - especially those that apparently like marking English essays (we are a masochistic bunch). Teachers in other countries seem to understand that there is an improper workload-to-money ratio in this profession. This is usually offset by the understanding that the job is intrinsically rewarding and that we are making a difference in the lives of our future generation. Apparently, we are a youth-loving nation. We're also Canadian.
4. There was something else here I forgot
In its place, I'd also just like to mention that none of the above really came as surprise to any of us. But at the same time, I try not to worry too much about it. I probably should (be worrying) but I figured it's hard to predict the future and all I have control over is what I do at the faculty of Ed. and how I do while I'm on prac. So far, both ventures have proven to be fairly successful. Does that success necessarily translate into the future? Of course not. But I figured it can't hurt to hope.
Being an education is one of those careers where getting yourself to the starting line is almost as hard as the actual race itself. First, you gotta decide that you want to become a teacher and then apply to get into the program (easier if you do it through Con-Ed, though it means you have to decide early). Then you have to make it through the program without losing your desire to teach (no small matter in itself). And then in the end, if you do decide that teaching is the right profession for you, you have to get a job in an incredibly thin market.
Mom wanted a doctor in the family. But would I listen? Nooooooooooooo
This blog, as you may guess from the giant, shiny apple graphic at the top of the site (and accompanying description), is devoted exclusively to the discussion of teaching-related issues. When we mention anything about our personal lives, it's always in the context of teaching. Labels: about us, finding a balance, self-improvement
"Sometimes it's hard to talk to kids, especially when they're teenagers. They're in their own world, and they don't look like they're even listening to you. But that's the time when it's most important to find a way to talk to them - not to lecture them, but to tell them things I think are important for them to know." - Robert De Niro Labels: inspiration, quotes
Wow, the past few months have been crazy hectic for me- hence the total neglect of this blog on my part. I apologize profusely for my absence, and for the lack of warning about said absence. I really thought I could keep all my metaphorical balls in the air (to use a clowning metaphor, always the best kind) but it just got too overwhelming. Labels: about us, amazing people, books on teaching, finding a balance, practicum, reassurance, tips
This is kinda gross but I couldn't resist posting about it...
So over the course of prac, I got sick. This should come as no surprise to anyone since it's a well known fact that our bodies are generally ill-prepared for all the germs that run rampant throughout the schools. I'm still a little sick, actually, but that is neither here nor there.
Well, most people will be able to tell you that as you near the tail-end of the common cold, you get to that period where your sinuses are all congested and your nose feels blocked even though nothing comes out when you blow into a tissue. This stage in the process tends to irritate me to no end and this time was no exception. I mean seriously, is it not supremely frustrating to blow your nose and get nothing but still be congested?
Suddenly, I had a thought. A few months ago, during my singing lessons, I was taught (when I sing) to breathe from the diaphragm and then, rather than sing outwards through my mouth, sing upwards, through my head, and then out my mouth. It sounds very theoretical until you put it into practice but it does work remarkably well at adding resonance to your voice. And I thought, "I wonder if that theory could work for nose-blowing as well?" So I tried it. I took a deep breath from the diaphragm and blew upwards into my head (and presumably through my clogged sinuses) and then out... and lo and behold! It works! I cleared my sinuses (temporarily at least).
I told you it was kinda gross. But it's also kinda funny. And it *does* work...
I took some time this afternoon to browse around the site, ratemyteachers.com, more out of curiosity than anything else. I imagine that some of us might eventually find our way onto that website sooner or later so I thought I'd check it out and see if there was any real validity to the site.
As a teacher-in-training, I figured that I would have a rather insurmountable bias by looking up teachers working at King City Secondary school; ergo, I decided to do a quick survey of the teachers I had when I was in high school and see what some of the results were. Now, before you read this, keep in mind that I can be incredibly elitist about my opinions when it comes to comparing myself to the "general public". It's not so much that I think that the general public is always wrong so much as it is that when pitted against an individual, anonymous, opinion that contradicts my own I have a tendency to assume that this individual doesn't know what he/she is talking about. In my defense, however, I do think that the "general public" as whole unit usually winds up with the correct overall opinion unless there are mitigating circumstances.
One of these mitigating circumstances, where ratemyteachers.com is concerned, is that the ratings are divided into 3 categories (which are then averaged out to an overall rating per teacher). One of these 3 categories is "Average Easiness" which I assume relates to whether or not the teacher is a "hard marker". The problem with this category is that it really should be called "Fairness" rather than "Average Easiness." Why? Because "Average Easiness" tends to devolve into "Will this teacher let me get away with not answering the question and bullshitting the answer," which doesn't exactly seem to be the right question; or at least, it doesn't seem to work on the correct scale.
This is what I noticed about many of the ratings for my old high school teachers - that their overall rating was pulled down because the rating in the category of "Average Easiness" was pulled down... and I'm sure (having been a student in these teachers' classes) that THIS happened because these were teachers that wouldn't let you get away with not knowing your stuff or BS-ing your answers. There's no reason they should be penalized for this as teachers but many students seem to live in this egocentric world of self-importance and self-privilege where a teacher that gives them bad marks is a bad teacher, even if these marks are entirely justified.
I looked at some of the comments for some of the teachers who got really high ratings in "Average Easiness" and came across many that said something like "Such an e-z marker! I was such a shitty student and still got an A- lolololololol!!!"
Yeah ok... cause that's the best indicator of a good teacher...
I attended my first ever "Professional Development Day" last Friday. I must say, it was not like I expected it to be. But then again, my preconceived notions were founded upon absolutely nothing one could call a reliable source (meaning, they were founded upon what my imagination conjured up). I thought we were all going to arrive at school and play trust games where we fell into each arms and such similar things! So disappointed to find that that wasn't the case. Instead, we had 2 hour assembly in the morning - one that was thankfully made far more bearable due to an interesting guest speaker - followed by a few workshops.
It was weird being at a P.D. Day. Having attended a staff meeting during my previous block (teachers make the worst students), the assembly part did not strike me as being too odd. The workshops, on the other hand, felt odd. Now, that's not to say that they were not helpful. In fact, one of my workshops was pretty cool (it was about a grade 12U culminating media project). But it just... felt really weird to be sitting in classroom with people who were not my age. I mean, staff meetings are staff meetings, but to actually sit in a standard sized class and listen to a presentation/lecture is just not the same when the "students" are years ahead of you in age and seniority.
All in all, though, it was not a bad experience. Better than I thought it'd be, realistically speaking (I figured it wouldn't just be fun and games, even though that's what I hoped it would be).
I thought I'd mention something I experienced yesterday. I was talking to some of my students about university and I mentioned something about the amount of effort you have to put into your work in order to succeed. One of my students piped up, "Yeah well, I'm just not trying very hard right now. Once [If] I get into university, I'll probably start trying a lot harder because then it's like my parents are PAYING for me to be there."
Well, that's not so surprising I guess. The downsides to a publicly funded education system.
We talked in class the other day about breaking down English sentences to their constituent parts (i.e. subject, predicate, etc... basically grammar stuff) and how practically every sentence in the English language is built the same way. It was actually pretty cool. I won't get into the details of it here because it's long, complicated, and took us 2 classes to fully understand, but suffice to say, it was informative, to say the least. Labels: English, getting them motivated, music, tips
Somebody put their hand up in class and asked about why it's important for us to know about how our sentence structure breaks down since realistically, no one's ever going to walk up to you and insist that you explain to them where you draw the line between a subject and the predicate. I thought I'd write a bit about my take on the matter.
Kate (see: awesome vocal teacher) likened English grammar to Music theory. And in a lot of ways, I think it's a very apt comparison. We study music theory because we understand that there are certain ways we hear sound and there are certain tendencies we expect when we hear music. Music theory helps you understand that there's a reason why a 4th scale degree almost always wants to move down to a 3rd scale degree; why a II chord almost always resolves to a V chord; why parallel fifths tend to make people with any kind of music sensitivity cringe. In the same way, English grammar helps you understand why almost every sentence in the English language is constructed using a fairly consistent way. In a lot of ways, we don't even realize that we've been conditioned to do all this. But if someone were to construct a sentence in a convoluted way, we notice it because it doesn't conform to what we've come to expect from every sentence ever constructed.
On some level, it's an elitist way of thinking. I once went on a long rant about how the song Fireflies by Owl City irks me SO much because they don't resolve their chords properly. For those of you who are interested/those of you who understand music theory, there is a leading tone - a LEADING tone of all things! - that resolves DOWN to the 6th instead of up to the 8ve. It makes me cringe just to hear it. But I've spoken to a variety of other people (non-music people), who don't seem to be bothered by it. And I always have to resist the urge to respond in some sarcastic, elitist fashion about how they're the reason why so much garbage is churned out by popular radio on a daily basis at the expense of my poor ears.
So you may be asking, is it really problematic if it only bothers those who have studied the subject? Well, the response I give to English teachers is this: music notes that don't resolve are similar to people making spelling errors. And lo and behold, suddenly, it's not something to scoff at anymore. English students tend to get highly annoyed by spelling/grammar errors, even if those errors don't detract from our overall ability to understand the message being conveyed. Why? Because English students understand that there are certain rules we're simply supposed to follow when we USE the English language. As a principle, you're supposed to spell your words correctly. That's a given right? Well, the same thing applies to tonal tendencies.
On top of everything, if you STUDY the subject, very often, you'll realize that there's a REASON why we do things a certain way. Resolving notes isn't simply an arbitrary process; neither is sentence construction. They almost always make our lives easier, whether it is psychologically, or practically. You might not think so when you're actually forcing yourself to apply these rules, but the rules are there to make things easier for you, not harder. Without these rules, you wouldn't even be able to read what I'm writing; nor could I be expected to write in such a way that you would understand.
In a lot of ways, it speaks to our fundamental tendency to connect with other human beings. We put systems in place so that we have a common ground off which we can build mutual understanding. Because if you didn't care about other people understanding what you say, sure, you can invent your own grammar and sentence structure if it makes life easier for you. And maybe, if you really wanted, you could teach other people your own rules. But eventually, your ability to touch others stops; your own personal influence can only carry you so far before you need your product (be it music, words, writing, whatnot) to speak for itself.
And for the records, I guarantee you that Owl City, despite being hugely popular now, will not be a band that people will look back upon when they think "the turn of the decade". There's just no way. Not if they don't resolve their chords.
For the record, I actually really like the Owl City album. Garbage lyrics and non-resolved-chords be damned.
Last month, I began my placement using reasoning that I believed would motivate kids outside of what they had to do for marks. I told them that e.e. cummings’ “i carry your heart with me” could win them any love interest; I told them that their Twitter musings were poetic and that their Facebook profiles were really character profiles of themselves. What I learned in my practicum was that while the above would win over some of the most skeptical of Canadian students, these particular ESL students just didn’t care about those abstractions—they cared about getting marks. To them, a Facebook page would never get them into university, and they had a very difficult time connecting to material that wouldn’t help them get 95%. The fact that I modified the motivation I gave them does not mean that I believe they are correct in being disdainful or what they see as abstractions; far from it. I will still mention the importance and relevance of the material in English classes to the outside world. However, after all of my careful crafting of interesting, creative activities to test comprehension, to my chagrin, the kids reveled in being given a quiz. So I decided that instead of fighting them, I would continue to give them activities that tested more than their skills at memorization, but remind them that learning and practicing the (to them) less traditional ways of showing their knowledge and understanding of a book would still get them marks and help them in university. I suppose over the course of my practica in undergrad I got the idea that every lesson had to be wildly creative and fascinating to my students; that everything the students learned had to connect to them on a completely personal level. In that process, I forgot what it felt to be in grade 12, panicking about being accepted into my program and university of choice. These students do look to the teacher to tell them what skills and knowledge will help as they enter the world of academia, so I have begun to give them concrete, detailed reasons as to why they should learn what I teach instead of why they would want to learn it. In reality, the students were motivated to learn the specific expectations I was teaching them(in one particular case, how to debate) because they knew that they would have to actually use those skills in a summative assignment the week after, and because they knew that in university, they would often be called upon to substantiate their answers in class and come up with rebuttals to their classmates' points. The kids really responded to that and worked very hard on the assignments I gave them. I did still mention, however, that my friends and I enjoyed many hours spent debating and discussing issues that had come up in class or in the reading of a newspaper article, and that with these skills, they might do the same (and perhaps already did). So in the end I integrated some parts of my former teaching philosophy with my newfound method of motivation. Labels: big questions, getting them motivated, lesson planning, practicum