Functions of Star Teachers

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Functions of Star Teachers

• EDU 701
• Kevin Walker
• Karen Anderson

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PERSISTENCE

• What is persistence?

• Stars believe that it is their responsibility to
  find ways of engaging their students in learning.
  They describe their jobs as the continuous
  generation and maintenance of student interest
  and involvement..

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PERSISTENCE

• In what three ways do star teachers demonstrate
  this persistence?

They feel a constant responsibility to make the
classroom an interesting, engaging climate that,
on a daily basis, involves the children in all
forms of learning. (Group needs)
Stars are persistent in meeting the needs of the
talented, those with handicapping conditions, and
the neglected gray-area kids. (Individual needs)
They find what works with problem children.
(Special circumstances)
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PERSISTENCE

• Contrast the persistence of a quitter/failure
  with a star teacher.

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PERSISTENCE

• Contrast the persistence of a quitter/failure
  with a star teacher.

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PROTECTING LEARNERS AND LEARNINGWhy do learners
in a poverty setting need to be protected?

• Children in poverty are less likely to have
  out-of-school models who study and learn because
  they are well-educated, enthusiastic students of
  subjects from which they derive personal benefit.

• For children in poverty, succeeding in school is
  a matter of life and death. They must make it in
  school or spend their lives in hopelessness and
  desperation. They have no family resources or
  networks to help them start careers or
  businesses. They must succeed in school to have
  any occupational mobility

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PROTECTING LEARNERS AND LEARNINGHow do star
teachers protect the learning environment in
their classrooms?

• Stars protect the learning environment from the
  students THEMSELVES.

• Stars believe that all students are naturally
  turned-on to learning.
• Stars employ both modeling of the learning
  process and the project method successfully.

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PROTECTING LEARNERS AND LEARNINGHow do star
teachers protect the learning environment in
their classrooms?

• Stars protect the learning environment from the
  teachers COLLEAGUES.

• Stars convince their colleagues that they will
  not be shown up or threatened in any way if they
  are permitted the freedom to teach using the
  project method rather than direct instruction.
• Stars build a network of colleagues with similar
  interests as their own.

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PROTECTING LEARNERS AND LEARNINGHow do star
teachers protect the learning environment in
their classrooms?

• Stars protect the learning environment from the
  schools PRINCIPALS.

• Stars convince their principals that the
  childrens test scores will not go down and will,
  indeed, increase.
• Stars convince their principals that the benefits
  are worth the extra fieldtrips, the additional
  equipment and unusual materials, the use of
  resource people, and the noise created by
  productive children.
• Stars are constantly negotiating for their
  students/classroom.

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PROTECTING LEARNERS AND LEARNINGHow do star
teachers protect the learning environment in
their classrooms?

• Stars protect the learning environment from the
  systems BUREAUCRACY.

• Stars always choose the children over the system.
• Stars try negotiation and reasoning, and to prove
  that their children are learning from the
  activities.
• Stars collect portfolios.
• Stars invite skeptical principals and others to
  visit.

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PROTECTING LEARNERS AND LEARNINGHow do star
teachers protect the learning environment in
their classrooms?

• Stars protect the learning environment from the
  systems BUREAUCRACY.

• Stars willingly submit to having their children
  tested to show that they are learning as much or
  more than children being taught by typical
  textbook instruction.
• Stars are also willing to move some of their time
  on projects to before school, after school, free
  time, weekends, and vacation periods.
• Stars are NOT WILLING to compromise the learning
  of their children.

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GENERALIZATIONS PUTTING IDEAS INTO PRACTICE

• Define the relationship between ACTION and IDEAS
  in a stars classroom.

• ACTION Stars can PERFORM teachers role
• Stars can conceive of numerous specific things to
  do to keep children active and busy.
• Stars are constantly searching for new, varied,
  and interesting activities to hook the students
  onto learning.
• IDEAS Stars can UNDERSTAND teachers role
• Stars can conceptualize and verbalize about
  teaching.
• Stars can see the purposes and implications of
  the activities in their classrooms .

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GENERALIZATIONS PUTTING IDEAS INTO PRACTICE

• What is the role of REFLECTION in a stars belief
  system?

• Teachers must continually develop and improve
  themselves.
• Without the ability to reflect on ones behavior,
  there is only rote learning.
• Stars are able to reflect on their experiences,
  and thereby grow and develop on a career-long
  basis.

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APPROACH TO AT-RISK CHILDREN

• Define AT-RISK student.

• Essentially, they are the children of poverty
  from diverse cultural backgrounds in our urban
  school systems.

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APPROACH TO AT-RISK CHILDREN

• What do stars emphasize as being the MAJOR CAUSE
  of students being at-risk?

• While quitters and failures emphasize the
  short-comings of the students, stars emphasize a
  wide variety of ways in which school curricula
  and teaching methods cause large numbers of
  students to be at risk.

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APPROACH TO AT-RISK CHILDREN

• Why do stars learn about their students lives?

• Stars genuinely care about their students.
• Stars want to help with a referral to an agency,
  or to report some sort of abuse that must be
  addressed.
• STARS WANT TO MAKE LEARNING MORE MEANINGFUL AND
  RELEVANT

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PROFESSIONAL-PERSONAL ORIENTATION TO STUDENTS

• What role does LOVE have in the teacher-student
  relationship?

• Stars do not see love as a prerequisite to
  teaching children. Nor do they see it as a method
  of teaching. They would rather use words like
  caring, respect, and trust.

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PROFESSIONAL-PERSONAL ORIENTATION TO STUDENTS

• What is the relationship between LOVE and the
  LEARNING ENVIRONMENT?

• Stars are sensitive teachers who are aware of
  their students and the learning environment.
  Stars are quite aware that they may initially
  exploit their close relationships/trust with
  students in order to get them involved in a
  particular activity. However, they are also
  sensitive enough to recognize this dynamic and
  work hard to quickly shift the impetus for
  childrens work to their choices, their
  follow-through, and the satisfactions they derive
  from pursuing an activity in depth.

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PROFESSIONAL-PERSONAL ORIENTATION TO STUDENTS

• What is the relationship between LOVE
  and DISCIPLINE?

• STARS NEVER SEEK TO MANIPULATE A CHILD WITH
  GUILT! They expect and plan for the times when
  even their most lovable children will engage in
  negative behaviors. Stars reaction is to
  patiently pursue the logical consequences of
  whatever has occurred. Stars show children that
  some things have occurred that are unwise or
  regrettable but were in this together and can
  work it out.

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THE CARE AND FEEDING OF THE BUREAUCRACY

• What skills do stars possess in regards to
  protecting themselves and their children against
  school bureaucracy?

• Stars learn which rules and policies must be
  obeyed and which can be ignored
• Stars learn which clerical demands must be done,
  which can be delayed, and which can be put off
  indefinitely
• Stars learn how to throw out most of what is in
  their mailboxes and deal with the fewest items
  possible

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THE CARE AND FEEDING OF THE BUREAUCRACY

• How does NETWORKING help relieve the stresses
  that the bureaucracy creates?

• Stars know which janitor, which secretary, which
  safety guard, which other teachers will help them
  do what they want with the least paperwork,
  permissions, or hassle.
• Stars know which associates and colleagues they
  can depend on for what
• Stars have a support network of teachers from
  various schools.
• Support networks counteract burnout by offering
  teachers mutual support and by generating
  activities.
• Stars are experts at making the system work for
  their children

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FALLIBILITY

• Do stars admit mistakes?

• Yes! Their confessed errors usually relate to
  reaching a judgment too quickly about which child
  may have initiated a problem situation, without
  getting all the facts. They are also aware that
  apologies must be made in the same manner that
  the criticism is made. In other words, you dont
  accuse in public and apologize in private.

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FALLIBILITY

• What do stars do with mistakes in their
  classroom?

• They actively teach children that we all LEARN by
  making mistakes. There can be no learning without
  mistakes. Making a mistake is not a sign of
  weakness, but a point of instruction.

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EMOTIONAL AND PHYSICAL STAMINA

• EMOTIONAL How do stars move past all the
  inescapable disappointments inherent in poverty
  settings?

• Stars move past the disappointments by focusing
  on the successes. They generally have a much
  longer and severe list of disappointments in
  their careers than do their quitter/failure
  counterparts, but they also refer to infinitely
  more instances when their students have had
  successes.

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EMOTIONAL AND PHYSICAL STAMINA

• PHYSICAL How important is it for a star teacher
  to care about what they are teaching?

• For stars, the learning process is living. It is
  full of growth and infinite potential and thereby
  invigorating. Stars act as if they can teach
  anything they care aboutand they care about a
  great deal. Perhaps the most accurate term for
  describing this quality is neither stamina nor
  enthusiasm, but irrepressibility. They are not
  worn down by children.

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ORGANIZATIONAL ABILITY

• How do stars manage MATERIALS?

• Stars are constantly seeking better and more
  materials that will benefit the children and
  their learning process.
• Stars generally have more and varied materials in
  their classrooms than do their quitter/failure
  counterparts.
• Stars select materials on the basis of their
  interest level and relationship to the project at
  hand.

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ORGANIZATIONAL ABILITY

• How do stars manage PEOPLE?

• Stars establish a high level of trust with
  children so that they not only take care of
  themselves but each other.
• Also, stars often employ several children as
  co-teachers

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ORGANIZATIONAL ABILITY

• How do stars manage TIME?

• Stars derive value out of miniscule amounts of
  time. No time is to be wasted in the learning
  process.
• Stars do not allot themselves grand amounts of
  time to lecture/direct instruction. They think,
  plan, and interact with children so that the
  children are speaking, questioning, finding out,
  testing, writing, measuring, or construction. The
  teachers serve as coaches and resources to the
  children.
• Stars often plan for multiple simultaneous
  activities. To quitters/failures this may look
  like utter chaos.

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EFFORTNOT ABILITY

• Why is EFFORT more important to stars than
  ABILITY?

• Stars place the emphasis on effort rather than
  ability because they are committed to individual
  differences, and to the immeasurable potential of
  all people if given sufficient encouragement and
  opportunity. Pursuant to this, they give no
  credence whatever to any form of standardized
  assessments of potential or ability. They favor a
  commitment that no one can possibly know in what
  directions and how far a still-developing
  immature youth might grow.

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EFFORTNOT ABILITY

• What steps do stars take to ensure that students
  put forth their best effort?

• Stars quickly determine the extent to which their
  students use ability rather than effort to
  explain success.
• Stars assess the degree to which the class is
  prone to deprecate one anothers efforts.
• Stars actively and directly teach the concept
  that trying and making mistakes are normal and
  desirable activities in learning as are the
  processes of correcting, revising, and polishing.
• Stars demonstrate their commitment to effort in
  their daily teaching, their marking and grading,
  and in the way they discuss their students work
  with parents and the students themselves.

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TEACHINGNOT SORTING

• Define SORTING as it applies to children in
  a classroom.

• The process by which children are academically
  screened or grouped by ability and subsequently
  labeled according to the results.

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TEACHINGNOT SORTING

• Why is sorting detrimental to the learning
  process?

• Sorting children into groups of can-dos and
  cant-dos forces teachers to predetermine
  which children can and cant learn. This mindset
  gives the quitter/failure teacher an easy out
  when a child is not successful and belongs to the
  cant-dos. It also, even if subconsciously,
  allows teachers to do less for the cant-dos
  since it would theoretically be a waste of time.

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TEACHINGNOT SORTING

• How do stars combat the sorting issue?

• Stars abhor labels because of their ability to
  limit those who happen to receive negative ones.
  They see all children as worthy of an education
  regardless of background or grouping. Indeed,
  they see their jobs as problematic from the onset
  and do not succumb to the idea that certain
  children should not be in their classrooms or are
  not their responsibility. Star teachers believe
  it is their responsibility to interest and engage
  the children in wanting to learn. They also
  accept responsibility for making their lessons
  relevant to students lives.

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CONVINCING STUDENTSI NEED YOU HERE!

• How is the issue of OWNERSHIP viewed in a star
  teachers classroom?

• The star teacher recognizes that the
  classroom/learning environment belongs to the
  students.

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CONVINCING STUDENTSI NEED YOU HERE!

• How is individual worth capitalized on in a star
  teachers classroom?

• Stars consciously create opportunities to
  demonstrate to the students that this is your
  class, your work, your effort. Whatever happens
  here thats good and praiseworthy is something
  that you make happen. I need you and we need you.
  Without you we wont have a project, a team, or
  an activity we can fully complete. Creating
  activities so that the youngster can readily see
  that the class really is dependent on him or her
  is what star teachers do.

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YOU AND ME AGAINST THE MATERIAL

• How do traditional classrooms position the
  children, the teacher, and the material?

• Usually traditional classrooms position the
  teacher as the expert disseminating the material
  which the children must master. Traditional
  classrooms put the teacher and the children at
  odds with one another with a brick wall of
  material in between.

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YOU AND ME AGAINST THE MATERIAL

• How do star classrooms differ?

• In star classrooms, the children and the teacher
  work together to tackle, dissect, understand, and
  master the presented material. Stars use coaching
  as their basic means of teaching, and coaches do
  not merely serve as sources of knowledge.

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GENTLE TEACHING IN A VIOLENT SOCIETY

• What role does environment play in the
  star/student relationship?

• Stars recognize the home environments that their
  students come from. They are also aware of the
  previous school environments that students have
  encountered. A star teachers first goal is not
  to make matters worse. Their second goal is to
  create a school experience in which students
  succeed and relate to one another in ways not
  determined by the threat of force and coercion.

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GENTLE TEACHING IN A VIOLENT SOCIETY

• Who is in control of how much and what a student
  will learn?

• Stars realize very quickly they can succeed only
  by getting off the power theme that ultimately
  EACH CHILD is in control of how much and what he
  or she learns.

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GENTLE TEACHING IN A VIOLENT SOCIETY

• What are examples of gentle teaching strategies?

• Put students ahead of subject matter. Use
  students interests. Generate students interest.
  Never go through the meaningless motion of
  covering material apart from students
  involvement and learning.
• Never use shame or humiliation.
• Never scream or harangue.
• Never get caught in escalating punishments to
  force compliance.
• Listen, hear, remember, use student ideas.

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GENTLE TEACHING IN A VIOLENT SOCIETY

• What are examples of gentle teaching strategies?

• Model cooperation with all other adults in the
  building.
• Respect students expressions of ideas.
• Demonstrate empathy for students expressions of
  feelings.
• Identify students pain, sickness, and abuse.
  Then follow-up with people who can help them.
• Redefine the concept of a hero. Show how people
  who work things out are great.

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GENTLE TEACHING IN A VIOLENT SOCIETY

• What are examples of gentle teaching strategies?

• Teach students peer mediation.
• Do not expect students to learn from failing
  repeated failure leads only to more frustration
  and giving up.
• Devise activities at which students can succeed
  success engenders further effort.
• Be a source of constant encouragement by finding
  good parts of all students work.
• Defuse, sidestep, redirect all challenges to your
  authority. Never confront anyone, particularly in
  public.

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GENTLE TEACHING IN A VIOLENT SOCIETY

• What are examples of gentle teaching strategies?

• Use cooperative learning frequently.
• Create an extended family in the classroom.
• Use particular subject matters as the way to have
  fights science fights about rival
  explanations, math fights about different
  solutions, social studies fights about what
  really happened
• Never ask students for private information
  publicly.
• Dont try to control by calling on children who
  are not paying attention and embarrassing them.
• Demonstrate respect for parents in the presence
  of their children.

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WHEN TEACHERS FACE THEMSELVES

• What are the five steps of overcoming our
  prejudices?

• First step A thorough self-analysis of the
  content of our prejudices.
• Second step Seek answers to the question of
  source How did I learn or come to believe these
  things? Who taught them to me? When? Under what
  conditions? How much a part of my daily life are
  these beliefs?
• Third step In what ways do I benefit or suffer
  from my prejudices?

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WHEN TEACHERS FACE THEMSELVES

• What are the five steps of overcoming our
  prejudices?

• Fourth step Consider how our prejudices may be
  affecting the many issues surrounding what we
  believe about schools, children, and how they
  learn best.
• Fifth step Lay out a plan explicating what we
  plan to do about our prejudices. How do we
  propose to check them, unlearn them, counteract
  them, and get beyond them?