The Academic Alpe d'Huez

Saturday, September 8, 2018

We are now twenty-three days postlaunch and I have my crystal ball in hand as I try and gaze into the future.  Here is what I see, using a bicycle riding analogy and a reference to the Tour de France that will probably put a smile on the face of my friend AO from Vino.  T4 and OtherT4 are at the base of Alpe d'Huez and they will be grinding.  In bicycle riding terminology, grinding is a pedal turn by pedal turn battle to climb up a steep hill.  It can be an exhausting, quadricep muscle screaming, test of one's will.  There is no quitting and you will not be defeated as you climb.  Can I have an amen, CMBR?  T4 and OtherT4 are not on a bicycle but they are grinding up a hill, and academic hill called Alpe d'Huez.  On a regular occasion Alpe d'Huez is on a Tour de France route and is a Stage 5 (high degree of difficulty climb) that will separate the contenders from the pretenders.  T4 and OtherT4 have begun that climb, and unlike the Tour de France, where climbing Alpe d'Huez is a one day event, T4 and OtherT4 are facing a climb that will last for one hundred and fifty-seven more days.

Sunday, September 9, 2018

Brr!  I'm sitting in my favorite blogging location, the screened in porch on the back of the house, and it is sixty degrees outside with a light rain falling.  After enduring the oppressive heat and humidity that blasted away at Indiana and surrounding states for multiple days, I'm good with the cooler temperatures.  What I find most surprising it this.  A very good friend of mine, SpecEd30+ and her former gentleman caller from our CMU days, that is now her full time gardener and spouse, left the heat and humidity of Michigan for the one hundred and three degree temperature in Tempe, Arizona.  For the record, the current home temperature for SpecEd30+ is fifty-seven degrees.  Lets see, 103 degrees minus 57 degrees equals a 46 degree change in temperature.

On Monday morning T4 will start academic day number twenty-four.  For the better part of the first twenty three days of the school year T4 was sending out feelers on what her scholars knew as far as math goes.  I recall that the first multiplication test involved the following numbers: zero, one, two, five, and ten.  If the average score for the sixty or so scholars that took the test was calculated the results would have been disappointing.  Multiplication was followed by place values and rounding.  Again, the results were disappointing.  Knowing the scholars didn't do well with place values and rounding, T4 regrouped and assigned easier place value and rounding problems to solve.  Sadly, the results were the same, disappointing.  I can't recall the exact day but one day T4 asked this question to a math class with thirty scholars sitting in attendance, "did you do any place value and rounding in the third grade?"  I heard two responses to the question, both said, "no."

Multiplication scores unsatisfactory.  Place values and rounding scores unsatisfactory.  T4 regroups again and hands me two math worksheets.  "Schultz, I need sixty-five copies of each."  With the two worksheets in hand, I head to the copier.  Ok, who wants to venture a guess as to what is on the two fourth grade math worksheets that are in my hand?  Are your ready?  Here is the answer, one addition and one subtraction worksheet, third grade math.

T4 started with the math worksheet.  The addition problems ranged from three digit numbers to six digit numbers.  Before starting any math assignment T4 selects anywhere from three to five scholars to sit at the hexagon and then asks me to join them.  When the math lesson starts, T4 is using a document camera and the large pull down screen that is at the front of the classroom for the twenty-five or so scholars that are not sitting at the hexagon.  I get started with my group and realize this isn't going to work.  T4 is moving through the assignment at a quicker pace than I am and the scholars at the hexagon, instead of doing the math problems independently, are just looking up at the screen and copying the answers. This isn't working, so I raised my hand to get T4's attention, and told her I'm moving my scholars to the large half round table that is just outside the classroom door.

Now I'm regrouping with my scholars in the hallway and the drama begins as the scholars are jockeying for position to see who will sit on my immediate right and left.  I put an abrupt end to the drama and assign seats.  "Ok," I say to the scholars, "lets get started."  As a reminder and I've said it multiple times, I don't make this stuff up.  "Mr. Schultz, I don't have a pencil."  "Where is the pencil that you had in your hand when you were sitting at the hexagon?"  "I forgot it."

Inventory check, does everyone have a pencil?  Does everyone have the math worksheet?  Good, let's get started.  I'm working off a small whiteboard with a fine point dry erasable marker with a poofter looking eraser on top of it and I realized right away this will not work because only the scholars sitting directly in front of me can see what I'm writing and all they are doing is copying what I right.  Moving to plan B as I'm getting pretty frustrated at the lengths I need to go through to do simple addition.  Now with a pencil in my hand I instruct the scholars to do problem number one.  As they get started I'm working individually with the scholar that is immediately on my right.  "OtherT4-F, you need to get started with problem number one."  The response, "I don't know what to do."  Stay calm Mr. Schultz, no stupid mistakes and no human errors.  "OtherT4-F this is an addition problem" and I point with my pencil to the problem and say, "how much is six plus two."  There is a delay, fingers come up and OtherT4-F starts counting her fingers until six are up.  "Good," I say, "now add two more fingers and tell me what six plus two equals."   Two additional fingers are up and now the finger counting begins again.  Working from the left hand to the right hand OtherT4-F is counting.  When she finished she said, "eight" but I wasn't sure if she was telling me the answer or asking me a question.

I just hit the Preview button to see what I have written.  It's getting too long.  I'll give you the abridged version from here on.  Addition, adding skills are weak.  If the scholars add two numbers, say seventeen plus fifteen, they know where the two goes (the seven plus five part) but are uncertain about where to place the one.  If they place the one properly (above the two ones in the next place value column) they'll forget to add the one they carried over to the two ones already in the next place value column.  Subtraction, this skill is even weaker than their adding skills.  If the problem is two minus seven, they answer five.  Further challenging these scholars is the concept of regrouping, or what we call borrowing.  

OtherT4 and T4 are grinding.  Pedal turn by pedal turn they are climbing the academic Alpe d'Huez and they keep this in mind as they climb.  Their scholars need to pass the state mandated academic tests.  If they fail, the school district takes a hit, the school leadership takes a hit, and OtherT4 and T4 take a hit.  The one saving grace both of my colleagues have should the scholars fail the state mandated academic tests is this, did the scholars show any improve over the previous tests.  If they did the pressure to perform drops and teaching careers continue.

You just read what academics was like for the first twenty-three days of the school year for T4.  Now it is role playing time.  After we switch roles I'm going to ask you a question.  When I do, I want you to give it some serious thought and tell me if you would be up to the challenge of climbing the academic Alpe d'Huez.  Here is your new role.  You are now T4.  You occupy the front of the classroom.  I'll sit in the back of the classroom where I have a really swell view of sixty scholars rotating through your classroom for math.  Are you ready.  Here is the question.  Will you be able to defeat exhaustion, the quadricep muscle screaming pain, and have the will to fight to the top of the academic Alpe d'Huez after I tell you that only six out of sixty scholars in your classroom are on grade level?

People, this is real.  You are reading about the life of two classroom teachers that have to grind on for another one hundred and fifty-seven more school days.  Before I leave, I'm going to tell you what T4 said to me on Friday before I left for the day.  "Schultz, we have to move on next week.  I'm already a full week behind where I'm supposed to be."  I looked at T4 and said, "you kidding."  She reached to her right, slid a document over in my direction so I could see it and said, "this is my academic pacing guideline that the school corporation gave me, I have to move on if they can do the work or not."