A Proper Thank You

I just posted a blog entry on Stories from School offering a big thank you to Tucson Unified for the support they gave us through the NBC process last year.

http://www.storiesfromschoolaz.org/2013/01/a-proper-thank-you-note.html

Mixed Metaphors of the National Board Writing Process

The following is the speech I presented to current National Board candidates at the opening of their working retreat with the Arizona K12 Center in Tubac last weekend.  

Correction: The following is the speech I wrote.  What came out of my mouth once I started speaking had a life of its own.  I had a good time, though, and I think I helped a few people.  

Mixed Metaphors of the National Board Writing Process:  Hammering Out Your Self-Portrait.

I pursued National Board Certification for complex reasons, as I’m sure many of you did.  I was led to it by the caliber of the teachers I knew who had achieved certification. They were smart, strong and had a certain clarity in their voices when they spoke about what really matters in schools. I was a little bit intimidated by them.  I sensed they were possibly quite radical, which intrigued me.  I wanted to see if I was like that.  I kept my eye half on it for years, and finally it was time.  The stipend at our school was looking very nice after years of pay freezes, and several colleagues were talking about precandidacy.  I knew I would have a cohort, and that appealed to me.  I knew it would keep me motivated as I pressed beyond the type of feedback I got in evaluations to explore who I really am  as a teacher.

Last year, I was sitting where you are, enjoying good coffee and too many carbohydrates with my colleagues, and waiting for the day to begin. I had overpacked with too many snacks and a rolly cart full of binders and student work. I was distressed, because I had had a necessary and yet seemingly permanent falling-out with my Student B, and I had already spent about 30 hours writing about his work. As usual when I miss school, I occasionally glanced at the time and wondered whether my students were doing the work I had left for them with the substitute.

During one of the opening activities, a colleague sitting beside me surprised me when she commented that she didn’t even care about getting her certification anymore. That she felt like the process was more about the format of the writing than it was about her practice as a teacher. She sounded bitter and tired.  It was the kind of thing someone might say when they are afraid of failure; a way to cope with the pressure. I didn’t know how to respond, because I really did want the certification and was not afraid to tell everyone I knew that I wanted it. And I needed to hear that what I was doing was worthwhile. I couldn’t really deal with the idea that it had no value. I can’t remember what I said in response, but her comment really stuck with me.  And got me thinking.

I agreed with her:  The certification process was very much about the writing.

But I also disagreed with her:  Just because it was about the writing didn’t mean that it wasn’t about my teaching.  It was about both.

And I want to talk about why I feel that way. And I hope that now that you are immersed in the standards and becoming familiar with the demands of each section of the portfolio, and are realizing exactly how much work completing your portfolio will demand, I can give you encouragement that even within the confines of the portfolio guidelines, what you are doing is worthwhile and gives you an opportunity to articulate and actually create your identity as a teacher. I hope that along the way here you don’t mind me sharing some words of writing advice that rang in my mind throughout the process.  They helped me, and I hope they help you.

In writing, we not only express thoughts, but we create them.  William Stafford, a great American poet and teacher of poetry writing, says “A writer is not so much someone who has something to say as he is someone who has found a process that will bring about new things he would not have thought of if he had not started to say them.”



If you teach language arts at any level, I’m sure you are familiar with the typical steps of the writing process as they are presented in most textbooks and teaching materials.  Often, they are presented linearly:

      

When I sat down to work on my portfolio, it would sometimes take me an hour or more just to settle, to get everything in place, to check personal and school e-mail, facebook, my blog statistics, upload all my documents to my class handouts websites... In the back of my mind, the core issues of each entry bubbled, simmered, incubated.  Thinkubated. By the time I was settled, the key questions had formed in my mind.  Then it was time to get coaching or speak to a colleague.  And so.  Finally, after a snack, I would write.  As I wrote, other thoughts and reflections bubbled behind my thoughts.  I took breaks in order to blog. Then back to writing. I wrote on March 23 of last year: “I am finding this year that writing is like stirring a pot that has settled.  You can't just stir the top half of the pot with that big wooden spoon, but all the contents that have settled at the bottom come whirling around with it.” I wrote several poems during times last spring, some even inspired by the students represented in my portfolio.  

I think we need to give ourselves permission as writers to recognize all of these things as part of the writing process. Maybe writing isn’t your medium. Maybe you take breaks to sketch, to play violin, to take a run, to call your best friend. Often, the writing process is presented as a series of linear steps, when any teacher who has at all reflected on actual writing processes probably already knows that really, writing processes are recursive and sometimes chaotic, which, given the time and energy, will eventually crystallize into something finished, if you are committed and if you trust yourself.  It is a process of discovery. You have to discover your process. And it takes time, and retreats.

I encourage my students to develop metaphors of the writing process that help them to acknowledge the way it happens for them, in reality, in the real world. I couldn't find any of my photos of their posters, so I created a little glimpse of what the writing process looked like for me:

One of my favorite writers, Annie Dillard, expresses why that messy process is important.  Her metaphor is more linear than mine would be, but she always inspires me:

   “When you write, you lay out a line of words.  The line of words is a miner’s pick, a woodcarver’s gouge, a surgeon’s probe.  You wield it, and it digs a path you follow.  Soon you find yourself deep in new territory.  Is it a dead end, or have you located the real subject?  You will know tomorrow, or this time next year.
    “You make the path boldly and follow it fearfully.  You go where the path leads.  At the end of the path, you find a box canyon.  You hammer out reports, dispatch bulletins.
    “The writing has changed, in your hands, and in a twinkling, from an expression of your notions to an epistemological tool.  The new place interests you because it is not clear.  You attend.  In your humility, you lay down the words carefully, watching all the angles.  Now the earlier writing looks soft and careless.  Process is nothing; erase your tracks.  The path is not the work.  I hope your tracks have grown over; I hope birds ate the crumbs; I hope you will toss it all and not look back....

    “You write it all, discovering it at the end of the line of words. The line of words is a fiber optic, flexible as wire; it illumines the path just before its fragile tip.  You probe with it, delicate as a worm.”

Writing is a verb. Like exercise, it is an action that you have to do. Writing is discovery. Writing is creating knowledge.  And what the constraints and time limitations of National Boards gives you is the suitcase, the plot of land, the frame. It gives you a map, but you have to plan the route and follow it yourself.

What Annie Dillard says about erasing your tracks is important.  Knowing ahead of time that much of what you produce may not make its way into your portfolio sets you free to say what you need to say, to rant, to pine, to complain, to brag.  And then decide what belongs in the entry later.  The idea of erasing your tracks is important, because it takes away any excuse for writer’s block.  William Stafford is almost more famous for this bit of writing advice than he is for his poems: “Lower your standards and keep going. When it gets hard, don't stop - it is hard because you are doing something original.”

If you have already plowed through two or three entries, I would bet that you followed this advice.  If you are stuck, go easy on yourself in the beginning.  It is the only way you will find the strength to begin.  And only by beginning will you discover the process that will lead you to what you have to say.

Entry 1, the case studies of two students as readers and writers, was the hardest for me. I wrote 27 pages of narrative and reflection about one student.  The whole time in the back of my mind, I knew I would have to chisel it down to five pages.  This worried me, but I just had to keep going.  I had a lot of help, but most of that help was in the form of questions:  Is this necessary? How does this relate to the standard? Do you need all these details?  At the Biosphere retreat last year, I blogged about the process of shrinking my entry: “Chisel, chisel, shape, shape.” A friend of mine who certified the year before me, Jenni Hunt, advised me “When you get to the end, it’s like writing haiku.”  So true.  But you can’t start there.

I agonized the most over Entry One.  I started it in October, and it was my last entry to be finished.  It also ended up being my highest score.

During the last part of the process is where I began to see how what would finally emerge from the mess of grand ideas, classroom moments, ranting, obsessions and self-doubt would be a crystallized portrait of who I am as a teacher.  My portfolio would not include everything, but the tough choices I would make as I stirred the pot and chiseled away at my haikus did ultimately define me.  When I mailed that blue box, I did not feel certain about very much, but I was confident that I had taken advantage of every opportunity to immerse myself in the process, to get much-needed coaching along the way, to retreat from daily life enough to experience all the messy chaos that was necessary, and I felt in my gut that I knew exactly where my weaknesses were.  I was hugely relieved to certify, but just as validating was looking over my scores and seeing that the strengths and weaknesses that I had identified during my portfolio process almost exactly correlated with the feedback I got on my portfolio.  The requirements and guidelines may feel restrictive, but working up against those gave me both clarity about my identity as a teacher and a set of new professional goals for improvement.

The writing process is not tidy, but it brings its own rewards that cannot be had any other way.  You must give yourself the time and space to experience it.

In the end, I followed Annie Dillard’s advice and erased my tracks.  My rolly cart filled with binders, files and AZK12 folders sat in the corner of my dining room untouched from March until November.  The day I found out that I had been successful, we celebrated with drinks around our little firepit in the back yard.  On a whim, I brought out the cart, and emptied all of the burnables little by little into the flames.  

All the work, all the drafts, it was all part of the past.  At the end of the line of words was my new identity as a teacher.  What counts now is what I do with that, where it takes me. 

So, enjoy your beautiful room, your fireplace, the comforts of food and the benefits of  the best professional support team you will ever have at your disposal. And know that it is about your writing, but the writing will help to create you, if you let it.

An Ending

Every ending is a new beginning.  But it's hard to feel the new beginning without feeling an ending, closing a chapter, boxing things up, cremation.

I chose to celebrate earning my National Board Certification by burning all my work.

This might seem like a negative way to end things, but it didn't feel that way.

Ever since I finished my portfolio and sent it in March 31 this year, I've had one of those little teachery rolly-cart things sitting around in my dining room.  It was filled with binders, folders from retreats, hotel writing pads, file-folders of student work.  I kept thinking, "I should really go through that stuff."  I'm sure my husband kept thinking, "I should really go dump that thing in the alleyway."  But I had forbid him from touching it.  Everytime I considered sorting through it, it seemed like a waste of time.  I knew that if anything came up during scoring, I had everything from my process either in the rolly cart or saved digitally on my hard drive AND Google Drive... AND the server at school... AND a flash drive.

[It would be a lot easier to blog if this dachshund would get off of my face.]

So anyway, I didn't touch it.  Then, when we moved houses, I moved it into our new dining room.  Much smaller house, though, and it's been in the way.

Saturday, we had my brother's family and a good friend over to grill out.  The weather has been absolutely beautiful here in Southern Arizona, and the evening was cool enough for a fire in our little fire pit.  After a couple of beers and marshmallows, Rich was joking about whether we had anything else from inside the house that we could burn.  I brought out my rolly cart, and slowly emptied it into the flames.

The fire burned hot, and the paper created gorgeous layered canyons of bright coals. I burned it all:  my drafts, my instructions, my rubrics, my worksheets, copies of student writing, reflections, doodles, and handouts. Handful by folderful. It was a long task, and a lovely sight. What a relief, letting go of the anxiousness about what was in those folders and worry whether I had made the right choices. The contents of the rolly cart were no longer part of my present, but part of my past.  My new initials are part of the present:  NBCT. And what will I do with my new initials?

Now comes the beginning. The beginning of what? I am not certain. I never am. I keep my eyes open for opportunity, and enjoy the adventure (except when I am agonizing over it.)

I am a National Board Certified Teacher!

It's a big day for me and two others in my English department. We are NBCT's!

Invisible Data. Stories from School.

My latest Stories from School blog entry for the AZK12 Center both recognizes the wealth of data that good teachers have about their students, and also questions the usefulness of that data outside of the classroom walls.

I have a really hard time staying under 800 words for these entries, but this one got a comment immediately.  Yea!

I definitely have more to say on the subject. When do I not have more to say?

National Board exam this morning

I am caffeinating and convincing myself I haven't caught a cold. In about an hour I take my exam ("Assessment Center" to those in the inner sanctum of NBC jargon).

Really the most demanding part of my journey, the portfolio, is over.

Last night I was talking to my brother who lives far away, who I don't talk with very often. His response to my efforts was "What, a Masters isn't enough?" I had a hard time condensing down what this is and what it means to fit into casual conversation. I am famous for my wandering, slightly self-centered tangents, and so my explanation sounded generic, prepackaged, like American cheese slices. And I sadly ended up pretty much equating it with the stipend I will receive each year I'm certified.

The conversation made me realize the select few folks who will recognize what those initials represent if I earn the privilege of putting them after my name. NBCT.

Well, I'd better jump in the shower. I'm out of coffee and it's time to go.

National Board Portfolio Done-- Whew!

I don't think it's quite sunk in, yet, the completion of (probably) around 300 hours of work on my National Board of Professional Teaching Standards portfolio, but the thing is in the mail, and it is finished.

Me and "The Box"

Besides exhaustion, I'm experiencing waves of gratitude, toward my husband, my students, my family, my colleagues, my friends, our coaches, and my fellow candidates. I have always been incredibly lucky to have people in my life who supported me in my goals, as obsessive and single-minded as I can sometimes get with them, and as random as they can sometimes be. But this goal wasn't random. I have been waiting for the right year to pursue National Board certification, and I can't be sure if I will achieve it, but I know I picked the right year to be supported in my efforts. Although we haven't edited each others' work, it has been uplifting to know that four colleagues at my same school took on the challenge alongside me, and that 39 of us in our district were on the same journey together.

And we had the most professional support from the Arizona K12 Center. The coaches, precandidacy course, the summer institute, the retreats, the coaching Saturdays... I have never been treated so much like a professional or given so much of what I needed, down to good coffee and endless supplies of mechanical pencils and excellent highlighters.

Thanks to TUSD as well for financial and personnel support.

I don't know how people did it on their own. I suppose I look at these early-achievers kind of like the pioneer women. You know, when I'm having a bad day with my kids, I think "If I was a frontier woman, I'd be hauling water to scrub my change of undies in a wooden bucket." And, hey, these little strategies help. When I thought about all the training and feedback and material comforts we've been given, it bolstered my resolve not to procrastinate.

In fact, I have done the most non-procrastination ever, and I am so glad that I did. Because this is not something that can be thrown together in a few days. Even digesting the structure of the portfolio has to be eased into... and then to get anything out of the reflection, the entries need to be deeply planned and thought through before any real writing begins. I give myself a huge pat on the back for remaining organized throughout, in my notebooks, on my computer and googledocs... anyone who knows me knows this is a huge accomplishment on its own. And it saved my behind... maybe. We'll see if I certify. But I can say wholeheartedly that the portfolio represents my most sincere efforts with my students, and the best of my writing and thinking. 

A written exam still awaits me in April (6 essays).  Hopefully a good night's sleep awaits me tonight.  A thousand thanks to all of you who have helped me.  I hope I am able to repay the favor!

Passive Voice

Passive Voice

These intentions of yours are
confounded when they are
inverted into the passive.

Power once wielded
by poet becomes
toy: The sins that are
committed,
the crimes that are
wrought, any repentance,
the concept thought.

The subject is
sought. What subjection
of the reader is
imposed in the name
of what?

A labyrinth of
folded statements is
wound to
the cliff’s sheer edge,
crumbs consumed by
reader who by
her guesses must be
led.

When the codec is
omitted the reader is
left hovering midair
a caricature
grasping back
for the last blind purchase

the subject a blankness
flung from
the sentence’s ledge

 
I am finding this year that writing is like stirring a pot that has settled.  You can't just stir the top half of the pot with that big wooden spoon, but all the contents that have settled at the bottom come whirling around with it.  So I sit this morning to begin working on my National Board portfolio for the day, and what comes up but a poem.  I'm sure it can still use some revision, but it's got potential.  Feedback welcomed. 
 
This happens a lot for me while I am grading papers, and it also happened during NaNoWriMo.  Have a good weekend, everyone, and send good writing/ revising vibes my way.  Good thoughts, prayers, lit candles, encouraging e-mails.  None of it can hurt!

Blargh! NBC Writing Process

Warning.  Pure ventage ahead.  Potentially little to no intellectual value. 

I cannot believe how long each little part of my National Board portfolio takes. 

I finished Entry 4 today (Professional Accomplishments) except for one verification form, but I swear it took me at least four to five hours total just to screen-shot, scan, format, label, print, put in order, etc., all the documentation for the five accomplishments, plus chasing down people to sign verification forms.  Thank goodness I ran into my old student teacher at Ike's one day.  That time does not even include the three dozen or so hours (at least) I spent evaluating, planning and writing up my description and analysis and reflection on each accomplishment (at least two accomplishments I had written about got completely chopped out.)  This is one of those tasks where, by the time you're done with it, you actually know what you're doing, but then it's done.  

Now I'm working on Entry 2.  I've already spent two hours today alone editing my written commentary for conciseness, trying to get 14 pages down to about 10 so I can add more reflection and end up with 11. I probably spent two hours last week writing and then paring down my descriptions of my instructional materials for this entry to get them onto one page.  Then I go to double check the formatting and find a post-it I wrote MONTHS ago, and a small footnote on the cover sheet that says I get a page PER ITEM to describe the materials and relate them to the video.  BLARGHY!   

By the time I get to the reflective writing, I feel incapable.  I mean, I have plenty to say (always) but is it the most intelligent distillation of all I have learned about teaching by analyzing my practice?  Hmm.  I can't guarantee that.  I have a feeling that if there is extra time at the end, I'll be pulling out all my reflections on each entry and rewriting them.  But at this rate, I've just got to capture whatever intelligence might be lurking in my 1" margin-Times-New-Roman-size-12-font-page-numbered-candidate-numbered consciousness and get it into the right page length.  And hope there is a tiny bit of time to regroup at the very end.

Mixed Bag. Missing My Mixed Greens

Well.  It's a mixed bag of news today.  My husband has well surpassed me in his number of Facebook friends.  He is the kind of person that makes such an impression-- people who meet him remember him, even when he doesn't remember them.  Oh, but I'm sure whoever is reading here is one of the people he remembers.  Actually, he is really good about it.  Part of that old-school Tucson society ethic, I think.  Anyhow, I probably won't be catching up with him anytime soon.

On a more positive note, I discovered an excellent substitute for pancake syrup:  two or three parts honey to one part water, one slab of orange zest using the vegetable peeler.  Microwave for 30 seconds & mix.  Truly brunch-worthy.  The things you discover waiting for payday.  It's national pancake day, you know.

I am missing my winter garden.  Last year we had chard, red leaf lettuce, peas, radishes, onions, cilantro, parsley and chives.   Or maybe it was the year before? Then after that we had a pretty good crop of basil, thyme and marjoram that lasted the summer.  My other summer veggies kept rotting out.   They either fried in the heat or developed strange fungi or fat caterpillars.  But the winter garden was wonderful.  I could pick the small chard, bok choy and lettuce leaves, and even the pea shoots, for salads and they'd grow right back.  The sugar snap peas never made it into the house most of the time-- we ate them off the vines.  And having parsley whenever I wanted it felt like a luxury.  The kids never did appreciate the radishes, but I did.  And the little white spring onions made grilling out a real treat.  I know I have better photos somewhere but here are a couple.  The garden wasn't fully established in the second one... but it didn't get a whole lot more verdant than that until summer...

It is absolutely a cliche to say that gardening grounds you.  But true.  It was a healthy sort of space-out, weeding around the radishes and peeking through pea vines to find just one more fat pod. 

However.  This school year I've been working on my National Board Certification.  The portfolio process is almost finished.  Just five more weeks.  In addition, Rich has been continuing to work toward launching a new product with his new company up in Scottsdale, Ability Dynamics, as well as both of us trying to finish renovating a property we've been working on and are heavily invested in, and trying to keep real estate clients happy even though most deals either never materialize or fall through for the same multitude of reasons that they have been all over the country.  It's been a lean year in terms of income AND time, and so the garden just did not happen this winter.  But I do miss it.

Meanwhile, today I realized that I have at least SOMETHING written for every prompt in my portfolio.  Amazing.  Amazing amazing.  So by the end of the day tomorrow, I do believe I will consider myself to have a working draft of the whole portfolio.  And then, it's chisel chisel, shape and shape.  A SAWP colleague who just received her certification said that by the end it was like writing haiku.  I can definitely see that.

The Gaping Maw of "The Box"

Across the desk, it stares me down.  The gaping maw of "The Box,"  mock-packed with construction-paper representations of each document which still needs to be finished for my National Board portfolio.

I ruthlessly chop away at what I've written, paring it down sliver by sliver, page by paragraph, into concise, glistening gem, cut to specification yet retaining, hopefully, enough of its natural essence to be appreciated.

This is not the fun part.  But I'm trying to finish an entry by dinner, so I'd better get off my blog. 

Cheers!

Music to Work By

[peeve-- apparently you can't link to pandora stations?  wth?]

Usually I don't work well to music with lyrics, but my Pandora station based on Pink Martini, Norah Jones and a buttload of thumbs-upped other similar singers is very soothing...

Especially for someone (me) who just planned out her next two months of work on the ol' National Board portfolio and has an awful lot of analysis writing ahead of her.  I'm in the thick of it now... the slogging through meaty mud parts where I actually have to give evidence that my purposeful teaching produced learning. 

Wait... there are a few more cover sheets and forms I can fill out before I dive into the sloggy parts. 

I am hoping to finish one of my entries this weekend to the point where I can edit.  And to draft another entry, very roughly. 

Ooh, here's another station that is working out quite nicely, based on Rodrigo Y Gabriela, spanish guitar.  Beautiful!

Pink Martini at Starr Pass amid Documented Accomplishments

Shuffling Pink Martini on my iPod.

Documenting my teaching accomplishments.

Curled up on a couch in a boulevard-sized passageway outside the ballrooms with massive glassed views of saguaro, ocotillo, a golf course, and, farther down the vale, the city stretching across the floor of the valley.  The crispness of the day refreshes me.

Enjoying the last couple hours of solitude among colleagues and music, writing and thinking.

NaNoWriMo No Naps! Day 5

I'm sitting here in my room at Starr Pass at my National Board Candidacy Working Retreat, trying to write the instructional context passage for Entry 1 of my portfolio.  And it is so quiet.  So quiet.  And my eyes keep drooping mid sentence. 

Several times today, I took a break from my National Board work by opening up my novel and adding to it.  I am writing in fragments, writing the chunks I know I will need.  I am allowing myself long paragraphs of telling, figuring I can go back and turn those passages into scenes at a later time. 

I have decided to have the point of view shift from first to third person throughout the novel, although I'm not going to tell why... that would be giving too much away.  If it doesn't work out I could always go put it all in first person...  see?  right there I was falling asleep in the middle of a sentence.  It's so quiet here.  I haven't had a good night's sleep in weeks.  The weird thing is, I haven't had any vivid dreams for a long time, either.  I was hoping writing fiction would maybe bring some dreams on, but so far, no.  Not even anxiety dreams.  Isn't that funny?

I'm going to go lie down, now, and snooze a little.  I'm sure I'll be continuing to work tonight.  On my professional writing and my nanowrimo novel.  The professional writing, I'm sure will be fine if I devote the time and effort to it. The novel?  Well, it's getting better as we go onward.  I'm thinking it's a young adult novel... unless I can find a way to bust it free.

Teacher Angst

Agggh!

Working on National Boards this year, I feel like this is one of the first times I have really made the effort to COMPLETELY do my job since I gave birth to my children.

Don't get me wrong, I work hard every year. I try to be creative, hold to some level of standards, get to know my students, try to stay positive, be a resource for them. I try, but when you have your own kids that level of commitment to the late nights, the crates of papers coming home for the weekend, it just changes. It has to, and overall it is a healthy change.

But now I feel compelled to be the best teacher I can be, to show myself what I have really learned about how to teach students to read and write after 16 years, and to give my students the best experience possible.

And, I am finding that my deep-down belief that our jobs may truly be impossible within the time we are given here on earth, and within the time we are given with each student, may indeed be true... Holy Cow, when you really try to do it all, it really never ends. But I'm trying. I really am. And it does make me treasure my students all that much more.

Signing off from school at 6:00 after a very long day, encouraged by the lovely photo writing of my creative writing class...

Stay tuned, folks.