How often will you say:

“It’s in the curriculum/schedule/contract.  I need to do this for my principal/PLC/RTI/a mandate/progress reports/awards banquet/ . . . we’ve always done this.”

In the beginning–when you were still dreaming of being a teacher–I bet the answer was different.

Maybe . . . You wanted to make a difference.  You thought you could relate.  You had a passion for your subject.

Whatever the case, you probably had a burning conviction that your reason was important–and that you brought something special to the table.

Clearly, regardless of your profession, you can’t be part of a system without agreeing (at least to some extent) to follow someone else’s lead.

Sometimes though, we’re not even aware that we’re checking off the boxes on someone else’s agenda–and, as far as agendas go, we’ve completely forgotten that we used one of our own.

As soon as you relinquish all responsibility for setting the agenda, your “why” changes.  And so does the energy with which you approach your craft.

Related posts:

1. Expectations: A new paradigm

Welcome to Part 4 of this series on The Teen Brain.  If you haven’t already, be sure to check out a very informative overview presented in Part 1, as well as practical information you can use today in your classrooms presented in parts 2 and 3 on feedback and relevance and experience.

Part 4 is all about movement.

Though it seems simple, and many people think that it’s something that should be left for recess and physical education, movement can automatically make students’ brains work better. According to Hileman (2006), “…movement is a reliable way to increase blood flow, hence oxygenating the brain…simply standing can raise heart rate by as much as 5 to 8 percent in just seconds.”

Our brains need oxygen, and there is a growing concern that students aren’t getting enough movement to keep the oxygen flowing to the brains.  If students seem to lose interest or are getting antsy, a simple 30-second stretch break may work miracles!  Debra Prigge (2002), agrees with Hileman, but then takes it one step further by saying, “Integrating movement into learning activities increases circulation and oxygen flow to the brain, which in turn can increase student attention.

Plan your class activities so that movement is built in.”  How hard is it for students to stand up and find a partner instead of just choosing the person next to them?  Or instead of handing back papers, have students come to the front to get them from you.  Though I didn’t realize this before, movement doesn’t have to be something that takes away from learning time; students can simply stand to discuss an idea with a partner instead of sitting at their desks.  Students love going outside; by having them do a “walk and talk” lap around the school, they’re getting a chance to have some fresh air, as well as get their bodies moving while they’re discussing a classroom-related topic.  As long as we give students a chance to be up and moving throughout a long class period, we are assisting their brains and helping them stay attentive.

Stay tuned for Part five tomorrow: Making Learning Meaningful.

Related posts:

1. The Teen Brain Pt 2: Feedback
2. The Teen Brain Pt 3: Relevance and Experience
3. The Teen Brain Pt 5: Making Learning Meaningful

An Annotation by Laurie Walsh

Brown reviews the beliefs of Harvey Daniels, author of Literature Circles: Voice and Choice in the Student-Centered Classroom, Katherine L. Schlick Noe, Ph.D., an associate professor at the School of Education at Seattle University, and Pam Chandler, a sixth-grade English teacher in California.  All three agree that literature circles are a fantastic discussion strategy.  The article discusses the discussion roles for lit. circles.  Noe states that “roles have the potential of undermining students’ natural conversations,” so the roles should be discontinued once the class is comfortable with the discussion format.  Chandler feels the teacher should eventually drop out of the lit. circle, but Noe believes that observing the groups is a valuable assessment tool.  Daniels and Noe believe groups should not be based on reading ability; Chandler disagrees because of student comfort level.  Brown finishes the article with all experts agreeing that lit. circles are effective for at-risk students, and lit. circles must provide students with choices.

Related posts:

1. Literature circles: voice and choice in the student-centered classroom. Daniels, H.
2. Key words in instruction: literature circles.
3. Active learning: creating excitement in the classroom. Bonwell, C.C. & Eison, J.A.

An Annotation By Laurie Walsh

The article states that traditional lecture methods – profs talk, students listen – dominate college and university classrooms.  (The same can be said, we know, for high school classrooms.)  The authors reiterate the importance of students engaging in higher-order thinking skills, which is not common in a lecture setting.  Active learning is defined as learning where “students must read, write, discuss, or be engaged in solving problems” (1).  Active learning can be incorporated in the classroom in many ways, one of which is discussion.  There are, however, barriers to this type of educational reform.

Related posts:

1. Inspiring active learning: a handbook for teachers. Harmin, M.
2. Ball, W. H. & Brewer, P. F. Socratic seminars. In Teaching in the block: strategies for engaging active learners
3. Literature circles build excitement for books! Brown, M.

I just finished my first two years of teaching. They were spent in a very challenging urban district that I soon learned was, in short, not a good fit . The challenges were many and rewards were few. And, although I have grown in leaps and bounds as a teacher from my first to second year (which I’m sure my students would attest to), by the end I was left feeling frazzled, destabilized and unsure whether I even wanted to teach.

Enter courage and renewal work.

I’d first heard of educational activist Parker Palmer while still completing a practicum as part of my teacher certification course. My supervising teacher lent me a copy of The Courage to Teach-which I admittedly did not even look through amidst the hustle and bustle of the first year of teaching. Still, I’d find quotes from Palmer here and there which always left me thirsting for more… such as this one:

“Teacher-bashing has become a popular sport. . . . Teachers make an easy target, for they are such a common species and so powerless to strike back. We blame teachers for being unable to cure social ills that no one knows how to treat; we insist that they instantly adopt whatever ‘solution’ has most recently been concocted by our national panacea machine; and in the process, we demoralize, even paralyze, the very teachers who could help us find our way.”

And so I was thrilled to learn that there would be an introductory Courage to Teach retreat right here in Tucson, Arizona. Time spent in retreat–full of self-reflection and solitude (as well as conversations amidst like-minded people) seemed like just what the doctor ordered…and I thought would help me transition form the last two years of teaching and clean the slate a little before starting a new position next August.

We met at a retreat center at Picture Rocks. The desert is stunning, and it was impossible to forget when being thrust in the center of it–beautiful saguaros dotting the landscape, nestled in the mountains. A labyrinth and various petroglyphs are some of the other features at the retreat center. But there really is something inescapable about being out somewhere–away from home, away from the buzz of cell phones and constant internet chatter–where all of your needs (including tasty buffet lunches) are provided.

The retreat began with us gathered in a circle, discussing some touchstones to really create a circle of trust for the retreat.The hardest part for many, myself included, involved responding to others with open, honest questions–to really hear another person instead of immediately rushing to fix their problem. Being comfortable with their own uncertainty is a deeper level of intimacy than the panacea of solutions we often offer as teachers–and not being expected to fix things offered us a deep and unexpected sense of relief. Presenting a problem and really being heard provides the speaker the chance to listen to their own inner teacher, so that they can make decisions based on their own inner guidance. It seems so wise in its simplicity but is easier said than done! (This was taken to another extreme when we practiced a retreat version of an old Quaker custom–a “clearness committee”–in which one participant details a problem or dilemma they are facing and the rest of the small group of participants spend several hours asking open, honest questions…without curiosity, problem-solving or their own agenda. It was an amazing experience for the participants.)

Much of the weekend involved reading poetry and stories. We would then write in our journals–not a critique, but a response reflecting on what we had experienced in our own lives or work that relates to a line or two in the poem. We would have up to a half hour to write and 40 minutes to discuss our answers in small groups.

It is difficult to describe the transformation that occurred within me during the three day conference… yet somehow the process of reflection filled me with startling clarity about the two years that have just commenced leading to the year that is about to begin. Reflecting and writing about a variety of topics, such as my own joys and sorrows, the idea of living a whole, authentic life, people who have helped me along my own path, and finding a deep sense of center amidst the chaos… is what called me to teaching in the first place. I left feeling a deeper sense of purpose and better sense of understanding of what brought me to teaching and how to continue my own practice in a way that is sustainable and productive. Getting away from the everyday bustle and to a quiet space was incredibly helpful for creating fertile ground where insights can grow. We ended with our own reflection on what we’ve seen of ourselves during the retreat and our own list of small ways we can continue to attend to ourselves and insights we identified during the retreat.

Any inner work must be sustained over time to truly be effective, but it is Parker Palmer’s theory that we must tend to the “who” that is teaching–fill ourselves up as teachers so that we may have a lot to give to our students without burning our candle at both ends. I suspect he may be right.

Yael Grauer just finished two years of teaching 8th grade Language Arts, Reading and Lifeskills in Tucson’s South Side, and is about to embark on a new journey teaching Humanities in a charter school. She is a graduate of Shimer College, the Great Books College of the Midwest. In addition to teaching, reading and writing, she enjoys desert gardening, lifting heavy things and training in Brazilian jiu jitsu. She also runs her own very successful blog at www.dirttime.org.

If you’re interested in learning more about Parker Palmer, you might enjoy downloading and reading this free article by Palmer entitled The Heart of a Teacher: Identity and Integrity in Teaching

or view it here:

The Heart of a Teacher –

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1. Using toilet humor to teach writing
2. The Library of Congress is Using Flickr: Shouldn’t Teachers?
3. How Teachers Are Like Superheroes

A teacher affects eternity; no one can tell where his influence stops. –Henry Adams

“It’s not what you said, it’s how you said it!” –my wife (more times than I can count)

Guys, let me tell you, I’ve been married for fourteen years now, and the moment you hear that, it’s pretty much over. Sure, you can debate semantics and linguistics all you want, and logically, on paper, I’m sure you’re on the money. Still, I hate to break it to you—you’ve got no shot. It doesn’t matter how airtight your logic. Your best option is to run up the white flag and surrender. Apologize as sincerely as possible and try to change the subject. Drop it and move on. This is fourteen years of marriage speaking. Trust me.

There is no way to win this fight, because what you said doesn’t mean a thing. The only thing that matters is what she heard. And what she understood about your meaning has a lot more to do with your tone of voice, facial expression, posture, and proximity than the words that came out of your mouth. Forget that you were in the process of pulling a bee’s stinger from your eyeball. It doesn’t matter.

I’ve noticed this to be true in the classroom as well. Regardless of how I feel on any given day, if I make a conscious effort to bring energy to my craft, the kids always seem more upbeat too.

It doesn’t matter what I say. If I say it with a smile, if my tone is upbeat, if I’m standing straight with my head up high, if I’m moving around the classroom, making eye contact—the kids are more engaged.

And thus, more learning takes place.

The opposite is also true. If I’m blah, to a certain extent, so is the rest of the classroom environment.

But this is all common sense stuff, right? Much like the stand-up comic, as teachers, we all know that our “delivery” matters . . .right? This isn’t rocket science.

Turns out, however—it is brain science.

How Feelings Are Contagious

According to research done at Harvard and the University of California at San Diego by Dr. Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler, who have been mining data collected from nearly 5,000 people over a period of twenty years, “Happiness spreads through social networks like an emotional contagion.” So if you bring positive energy to your lessons, that energy is going to rub off on your students.

But why is this? Here is where it gets truly fascinating. They’re called, mirror neurons, and their job in the brain is to literally mirror observed emotions so that a person actually feels the pain and joy of others.

This truly astounding neural WiFi was discovered by neuroscientists in monkeys in 1992; but they have since also confirmed the presence of mirror neurons in the human brain through a series of experiments so sensitive it boggles the mind. It turns out we now have electrodes so laser-thin that they can be implanted within a single brain cell. Not only are they small, but these electrodes are so sensitive that they can measure the firing of a single neuron.

In his book, Social Intelligence: The Revolutionary New Science of Human Relationships, Dan Goldman reports of a remarkable study. After implanting and monitoring an electrode in a fully conscious person, scientists found that the same specific neuron will fire when a person anticipates pain (of a pinprick) as well as when watching someone else receive a pinprick. As Goldman puts it, the lighting up of that electrode is the equivalent of taking a “neural snapshot of primal empathy in action.”

But that isn’t even the most powerful discovery. To understand that, we have to revisit what Christakis and Fowler discovered about happiness. As it turns out, the energy you bring to the classroom doesn’t merely stay there for the benefit of only that class with only that lesson. It ripples outward and affects people you don’t know, have never met, and in places you may have never been.

According to Christakis and Fowler, if you project positive energy, you increase the chance of feeling good in those near you by 25%, but it doesn’t stop there. When your students leave the classroom, people close to them (friends, family, neighbors, etc . . .) enjoy a 10% chance of experiencing positive energy. Likewise, a person close to that person has a 5.6% chance of getting a positive charge.

Ever wonder what happiness looks like? Each node in the diagram represents one person (circles are female, squares are male). The lines indicate relationships (black = siblings; red = friends, spouces). Color represents degree of happiness, with blue indicating “the blues,” and yellow indicating sheer joy. Green is somewhere in between. Images by Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler, courtesy of BMJ

The Impact of One Teacher

What does this mean? Let’s just say, for the sake of simplicity, that you come in contact with 50 students a day, and each of those students then interacts with just five other people. That’s 250 additional people that you can affect–bringing your total to 300. But it doesn’t stop there. Remember, you still have a 5.6% chance to affect all those who connect with those additional 250. If we keep it simple and give those 250 each five contacts, that increases your potential outreach by 1,250–bringing your grand total to 1,550 people each day.

And that’s just based on the students in your classes! (Yes, yes I know you teach more than that, but, “Dammit Jim! I’m a Language teacher not a mathwiz!”) Now calculate, if you like (and you are a math wiz), the rest of your contacts in a day, and you’ll truly begin to understand the scope of your influence.

You should feel good about that. Still, guys, it would NOT be wise to bring that up during your next communication snafu with your wives or girlfriends. It won’t help. Trust me on this one. Sometimes it is what you say.

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Related posts:

1. Inspiring active learning: a handbook for teachers. Harmin, M.
2. Visioning and the development of outstanding teachers. Duffy, G.
3. Teaching the Teen Brain.