topham's attic: newsy Friday

Friday, February 5, 2010

newsy Friday

Some news today:

Juniors... The project version of the Portrait assignment will have an extended deadline past the long V-Day weekend. The essay version will be due next Thursday.

Note: If you registered for Creative Writing, you must send your writing sample (300-500 word description of a place that means something to you) to Mrs. Forst ASAP! Do it today!

Sophomores... Your Grapes of Wrath projects have also been extended through the long weekend. However, you do have an assignment due on Tuesday:

Write a 2-page (500 words approximately) essay discussing one specific aspect of the John Ford film of The Grapes of Wrath as an interpretation of the John Steinbeck novel. In this essay, discuss why Ford might have made done it the way you are noting and what effect this has on our understanding of the book's message.

Drama... Here is an exercise in Concentration that you can try this weekend. It will take fifteen minutes. Find a place where you can go that is frequented by lots of people. (The mall?) Seek out a spot to stand, sit, lean, etc. Focus all of your attention on a specific object. See that object from every possible angle (without actually moving from your spot). Enter it if you can. Can you look out from within it? Do not move during this exercise. If someone comes up to you to ask what you are doing or if you are OK, reply, "Don't bother me; I'm acting." (You may add a "please" if it seems rude.) We'll discuss this on Monday.

Meanwhile...finish reading Chapter 1 and the opening of Chapter 2. Prepare a story joke (exercise 2.3/#6) for Tuesday.

Any Wes Anderson fans out there?

Tomorrow's Conferences: Check the schedule; next week's conferences have been rearranged to fit on a TWTh schedule.

Notes to Parents

8/24/14

Hi, everyone, and welcome back to another (or your first) year at LFHS.

What you have heard is true. The English teacher has lost her ever-loving mind and is not going to be giving any grades at all in her classes this year. Not. One.

There will be no percentages, no numbers, no scores, no letters, no anything that will count toward anything that will end up being averaged for a final grade. But before you call in the men with the white coats, let me explain:

As I hope you have read in the doc your son or daughter (I have always hated the phrase "your student" when addressed to a parent) should have showed you, there is a wealth of research that indicates that grades--or the need to achieve them--are the single greatest thing that stand in the way of a great education. Studies show that the most influential thing a teacher can do to help a student grow academically is to allow him or her to self-grade. Most teachers would rather climb Mt. Everest dressed only in a swimsuit.

But the thing is: our academic system is severely broken. We say that our goal is to get our students to master Common Core Standards, and that is all well and good. But if that is truly the goal, then why do we care how long it takes them to master them? I'm serious. Think about it this way:

Try to remember back to when you were learning how to ride a bike. Oh, it was scary. You needed all kinds of support at first, lots of help from Daddy or Mommy. Then they let go and you were very, very wobbly. Probably you fell off, maybe several times. It took quite a while before you completely mastered the skill. But when you had...you had it down perfectly for the rest of your life.

Now imagine if you were being graded on that learning experience the way schools grade you. We would not score those first scaffolding attempts with Mommy and Daddy, but then...oh, you failed those quizzes when you fell off. And those wobbly rides? C's at best. Then a bunch of B's probably before you finally settled into 100% forever. But if we graded you right at that point, you'd probably average, oh, 83% or so. Why? You've mastered the skill perfectly. So why do you not get 100% if that is what we say we care about? Why on earth do we care about all those earlier times when you didn't have it down yet?

That will be what we go for here. Students will know what the goals are. They will understand what an "A" student looks like. And they will know when they have mastered an objective. Those who do so earlier than others will become tutors to those who have not yet done it: everyone gains from this and the newly learned skills, instead of being quickly forgotten as things studied for a test usually are, will continue being applied as masters tutor their classmates.

That is an awful lot to imagine will happen because I don't give grades this year, but what the heck: if you don't dream big, you never win big, right? The research is behind this, as is the school administration. I'm happy--well, actually I am excited--to pilot this concept at LFHS. As always, I'm glad to discuss this or anything else with you.

Karen

Feel free to email me any time at ktopham@lfschools.net.

topham's attic

Friday, February 5, 2010

newsy Friday

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