The thing I like best about my school is the small class sizes.  The largest class I have is 13 students.  With my cooperating teacher and me both in the classroom, we are really able to give kids plenty of one-on-one interaction.  That should make lab experiences a lot of fun. 

My cooperating teacher is very inspiring.  She has been teacher for about ten years and has taught all levels of science in the school.  She believes in holding students accountable and not “dumbing down” information just to award A’s.  It seems like the students respect her and she has good relationships with many of them.  So far….knock on wood….. we haven’t had any behavioral problems but I look forward to learning from her in this aspect as well.

Next week, I am teaching a lesson on macromolecules.  The biggest challenge in teaching teenagers is making the information relevant to their lives.  I think in this instance I will show them that learning about proteins, carbohydrates, lipids, and nucleic acids will be able to help them recognize the fallacy of statements like “eating too much sugar causes it to turn into fat” or “muscle will turn into fat when you stop lifting weights/exercising.”  I think those are things they might have some interest in.

Okay, that’s the 4-1-1 for Week One.  Only eleven more to go…….

This classroom is the most challenging of the three I viewed.  There is a mixture of boys and girls and pretty racially divided between black and white students.  They are all freshman.

The teacher seems to have a rough time keeping order in the class.  There is a group of boys who continually disrupts her lecture and bothers the other students.  At one point, she had to stop teaching in order to have a one-on-one discussion with a boy for throwing pencils at his classmates. 

Because of the boys’ rowdy behavior, the girls basically have no voice in the class.  There were two girls who seemed to be on task and understood the material being presented but given the behavior of their classmates, they had no opportunity to publically excel. 

One of the most interesting students was a girl with an emotional disorder.  This young lady refused to participate in any assignments or classwork.  She refused to follow even basic school policies until the teacher made an issue of it.  In the end, this girl actually directed curse words defiantly to the teacher.  I could tell that the teacher was trying to decide how far she wanted to take the battle.

After class, the teacher was kind enough to take the time to discuss her experiences with me and explained how the young lady would most likely be getting an IEP very soon after a meeting with her parents.

While I don’t feel it is my place to offer advice to an established teacher, I I did learn several things not to do.  I don’t think a teacher can ignore as much as this teacher chooses to ignore.  The classroom devolved into chaos with very little instructional time.  It seemed like the students had very little respect for this teacher and as a result, learned very little in her classroom.

• Have high expectation of ALL girls and encourage them to fight against stereotypes.
• Call on girls as frequently as you do boys.  Ask them the hard questions too.
• Do not teach “learned helplessness” by babying female students.
• Talk to other teachers and staff members about watching out for subtle behaviors that discourage girls.
• Make your language gender-free.
• Give quality, detailed feedback to both boys and girls.  Don’t just nod or say “good.”
• Ask a question and then wait a few seconds before calling on someone to answer.  In general, boys raise their hands and THEN think of the answer.  Girls think of the answer and then raise their hand.
• Do not interrupt students while speaking.  Make sure other students are showing the same respect.
• Ask girls to carry boxes.  Ask boys to clean shelves.  Do not assign classroom chores according to traditional sex roles.

If you have any other suggestions to add to this list, please do!

This is a line from the 1847 book “The Education of a Daughter” by Archbishop Fenelon addressing the subject of science education for women.  Unfortunately, there are many studies that show that as girls progress through school, their enrollment and achievement in science classes declines compared to boys of the same grades.  At the age of nine, boys and girls are about on the same level in science but around the age of thirteen, a difference begins to show that increases dramatically until by the age 17, where girls score notably lower in the sciences, especially in physics.

There are two main hypotheses as to why this is.  The first says the differences between boys and girls is biological and therefore, a child is born with an innate ability towards math and science.  The second says that the problem isn’t biological.  The problem is the way science is taught in the classroom and also how girls are raised in our society.

So which is it?

Quick brain overview:  The brain has three basic layers – cerebral cortex on top, limbic system in the center, and the brain stem at the bottom – and it grows from the bottom up.  The brain stem is the most primitive part of the brain and is responsible for the survival instinct of “fight or flight”.  The limbic system processes emotions, and the cerebral cortex is where thinking occurs.  Also remember that the right hemisphere is associated with verbal ability while the left is associated with spatial ability.

When we teach students, they are using the top of their brain…..unless the lesson stimulates an emotional response.  At that point, the limbic system interacts with the cortex and slows down thinking.  Why is this important?  Because if a girl has an emotional response to science, i.e. believes she is not capable of learning it, her brain concentrates blood flow to the emotional part of her brain rather than the thinking part.

There are developmental differences that occur in utero between male and female fetuses.  Keep in mind that in the uterus, there can be no gender specific socialization happening.   All people begin as female in the womb.  About six weeks after conception, a surge of male hormone causes structural differences.  Boys are more active and less flexible.  Their cortex develops more slowly than females but their brain is 10% larger in mass.  They have more activity in the brain stem and have smaller corpus callosum (responsible for communication between the two hemispheres).

In general (and that’s important to remember), girls tend to reason by induction, boys by deduction.  Girls do better with manipulatives where boys are able to solve problems abstractly.  Females are more verbal and are better listeners.  Males prefer to work silently or speak in “jargon.”  Boys become bored more quickly which may cause them to act out in class.  They take up more space when working and move around more.  Girls prefer to work in a group environment with less structure while boys prefer assigned roles.  Girls communicate better through the written word but boys are better as using graphs and diagrams to make their points.

On the other hand, those who believe that socialization is responsible for the science disparity between boys and girls maintain that there has never been any gene or brain function that would prove that girls are less capable in science and math.  They argue that boys and girls are treated differently based on gender before they are even born.  Girls are small.  Bos are large.  Girls are soft.  Boys are strong.  Girls are beautiful.  Boys are alert.  In the end, even the most well-meaning parents condition their girl children to be more successful in the verbal realm rather than the scientific.

In elementary school, science lessons are asocial, individual assignments that just aren’t as appealing to girls.  This begins to turn them off to science.  When they enter high school, science is more optional and so they opt out.

Our society cannot afford to alienate more than half our population from science and math if we wish to conquer our social problems.  We are better when we ask why science doesn’t appeal to girls rather than why can’t girls learn this.  We need to change our teaching approach in order to bridge the gap between male and female achievement in the sciences and math.

Far too often in classroom, the focus is on the material being taught rather than the students.  Students are given information and then asked to regurgitate it back on an exam.  I believe that it is a teacher’s job to teach students to think and to create ideas while developing their individual minds.  Yes, concrete facts and classic knowledge are important but I think education should help students develop their personal values and understand where they fit in with the human experience.  My educational philosophy reflects these beliefs.  I have strong tendencies toward both the existentialism and progressivism philosophical orientations to teaching.

The existentialist movement is based on the philosophical attitude called existentialism.  Existentialism is connected with diverse philosophers such as Soren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Jean Paul Sartre.  Educational existentialism is a rejection of the traditional, essentialist approach and authoritative truths.  Rather, we believe that it is the individual who is responsible for determining their own truths and values and to mold these values using our free will.

Translated into the classroom, existentialism means that assisting students to understand and value themselves as unique individuals who take responsibility for their thoughts and actions takes priority over subject matter.  I believe this means that my role is to expose student to different options in life and to create an environment that gives them the confidence to choose a path that is right for them.  It is about the education of the whole person rather than just the mind.  I do believe that curricular structure is important but this can be accomplished while still giving students a wide choice of activities in any given subject matter.

Progressivism is rooted in the philosophy of John Dewey who believed that the only truth in the universe is the existence of change, not as an uncontrollable force but rather change directed by human intelligence.  Progressivism values the individual, science, and change.  Dewey believed that a book is not a substitute for doing.  As a scientist, I fully believe that students will learn more from performing experiments based on certain scientific principles than if I were to simply give a lecture on the same principles.  Even Dewey’s five step method for problem solving parallels the scientific method used in research today.

In the classroom, progressivists mold their curriculum to fit the abilities and interests of their students.  It is a teacher’s responsibility to spark curiosity and to encourage students to reach higher levels of knowledge.  Students are encouraged to interact with one another as a means to develop traits such as cooperation and toleration.  They are also given a curriculum that acknowledges the accomplishments of minorities and women as well as the usual recognition of white males.  Students learn to be flexible problem solvers as the encounter problems in the classroom that will help them deal with the outside world.

I believe these two philosophies complement one another quite well.  Both philosophies focus on the individual rather than concrete facts, and both philosophies concentrate on education as a process of discovery rather than memorization.  While I do understand there is fundamental core knowledge that essentialists and perennialists believe must be taught, I do not think it is necessary to take away a student’s choice in order to achieve this because that is ignoring the fact that students have different learning styles.  I also understand the behaviorist’s viewpoint that a classroom must have some control over student behavior but this should never be a teacher’s primary objective.  In my opinion, denying a student free will opens the door for hostility and aggression, an environment that is hardly ideal for learning.

Education should be an ongoing process of growth and enrichment, not simply a preparation for a career.  In my classroom, I will attempt to make school interesting and useful by focusing on the individual and allowing students to direct and pace their acquisition of information.  Learning is an active, organic process and it is important to consider a student’s interests and their individual choices.  A teacher’s role is that of an interactive guide who will provide students with experiences and lessons to help them determine their personal path in life.

I struggled with defining what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was interested in so many topics and wanted to try so many things. I eventually lit on the sciences and earned a biology degree from Eastern Kentucky University in 1999. I worked in science for the next ten years, in industry, academia, and government. While I enjoyed the work that I did and believed in its importance, there was always a part of me that wanted to do something more, something where I could interact with growing minds and help them appreciate learning, especially scientific knowledge.

I had been fortunate to have very positive volunteer experiences working with teenagers and have always felt drawn towards the potential and challenges that age group brings. My first meaningful volunteer experience was with the Methodist Home in Versailles, Kentucky. The Methodist Home is service agency that helps children who have been abused. I spent the day with a group of teenagers (14-17 years old) teaching them an introductory class on bird groups and basic identification of birds common to Kentucky in the summer. I found it extremely enjoyable to prepare a program from scratch and to have it so well received by these kids.

Another meaningful volunteer experience was during a summer that I taught a church youth group during Sunday School. Again, I had the older teens (age15-18) and while we did have some structure to our lessons, the most memorable part for me was our free discussion times. These were times where the kids determined what we talked about while I simply guided the conversation and kept everyone on track. I was the “voice of experience” to their youthful questions and concerns. It was during this time that I fell in love with teenagers, with their energy, youthful idealism, and potential.

I also spent five years as a coach for a teen bible quizzing team associated with the churches I attended at the time in Indianapolis and in Frankfort, Kentucky. This required meeting with a group of five to fifteen committed teenagers for several hours a week to help them become familiar enough with large pieces of Scripture that they could answer very obscure questions. They would also have to memorize a percentage of the Scripture to be competitive. This was my first extended experience with creating drills and exercises to help kids learn and retain the information. In addition, I had the opportunity to develop close relationships with several of the team members, including one boy from an emotionally neglectful home. It was a challenge to earn his trust over the two years I worked with him but in the end, we enjoyed joking and bantering back and forth.

My most recent volunteer experience was tutoring mathematics at the Thornhill Learning Center in Frankfort, Kentucky. I worked with a high school student on her difficulties in algebra. This was a challenging experience. The student frequently skipped our scheduled meetings and there were some negative parental behaviors that contributed to the student’s lack of effort in her math class. In the end, the student quit the tutoring center and I felt like I had failed her. I would not label this experience as a successful one in terms of academic achievement but I believe we can learn as much from our failures as we can our successes. I learned how important parental attitude is to a student’s educational experience. I also learned that in order to be a successful math tutor, I would need to expand my teaching methods in order to have multiple approaches to help students who have difficulties.

After working in the biological field for ten years, I wanted to combine the scientific theory that I loved with the satisfaction I received working with teenagers. I decided to return to school full time to earn my teaching credentials so that I can get a job in a classroom teaching teenagers about science, and even more importantly, instilling in students a love of knowledge and the means to fulfill that desire.

Essentialism (8 points):  Essentialism was a response to progressivism and advocates a conservative philosophic perspective.  The emphasis is on intellectual and moral standards that should be transmitted by the school.  The  core of the curriculum should be essential knowledge and skills.  Schooling should be practical and not influence social policy.  It is a back-to-basics movement that emphasizes facts.  Students should be taught discipline, hard work, and respect for authority.

Behaviorism (9 points):  Behaviorism denies free will and maintains that behavior is the result of external forces that cause humans to behave in predictable ways.  It is linked with empiricism, which stresses scientific experiment and observation.  Behaviorists are skeptical about metaphysical claims.  Behaviorists look for laws governing human behavior the way natural scientist look for empirical laws governing natural events.  The role of the teacher is to identify behavior goals, and establish reinforcers to achieve goals.

Perennialism (15 points):  The aim of education is to ensure that students acquire knowledge about the great ideas of Western culture.  Human beings are rational, and it is this capacity that needs to be developed.  Cultivation of the intellect is the highest priority of an education worth having.  The highest level of knowledge in each field should be the focus of curriculum.

Reconstructionism (15 points):  Reconstructionists advocate that schools should take the lead to reconstruct society.  Schools have more than a responsibility to transmit knowledge; they have the mission to transform society as well.  Reconstructionists go beyond progressivists in advocating social activism.

Progressivism (24 points):  Progressivism focuses on the child rather than the subject matter.  The students’ interests are important; integrating thinking, feeling, and doing is important.  Learners should be active and learn to solve problems by reflecting on their experience.  The school should help students develop personal and social values.  Because society is always changing, new ideas are important to make the future better than the past.

Existentialism (27 points):  Existentialism is a highly subjective philosophy that stresses the importance of the individual and emotional commitment to living authentically.  It emphasizes individual choice over the importance of rational theories.  Jean Paul Sartre, the French philosopher claimed that “existence precedes essence.”  People are born, and each person must define him- or herself through choices in life.

Our first learning experience was doing small group team building exercises with our sister university.  The university I attend is a small HBCU in the capital city of Kentucky.  Our sister university is a small university that serves the needs of Appalachia.  The interaction was a bit stiff and I regret that we weren’t able to spend more time getting to know one another.  Our professor warned us that the sister students were not exposed to much diversity of any kind and I could see that.  But I did appreciate the Appalachia culture that was shared by some of those students.  I learned that family and community is very important in Appalachia.

We were able to view an ESL classroom.  I’ll admit that the best part of this classroom was the live chinchilla that some students got to hold.  The ESL classroom was small but brightly decorated.  Labels of English words were on most objects to help the students learn English.

Each member of my class was assigned a fifth grade buddy that we will work with online and when we return to the school in October.  My buddy was a fifth grade African-American girl with an eager smile and a very outgoing personality.  We ate lunch together and it was so much fun to watch her and her friend interact with each other about boys and their families.

Our first academic interaction was with a Kindergarten class.  The class was set up in small groups of desks…about five or six students to a group.  The most interesting thing in this class was how well the teacher empowered her students.  A student was responsible for “calendar time” which involved days, dates, months, weather, and even counting.  The student-in-charge goes through the steps by calling on her classmates for answers.  I thought this was a great confidence-building exercise for the students.

Our last interaction of the day was during a creative arts class of Kindergarten students.  My groups had a shy but sweet girl and a highly functioning autistic boy.  I wonder if the set up of the class worked well for the boy.  We worked our way through six or seven creative stations (puppets, dress up, blocks, books, etc) and the environment quickly became loud and chaotic.  I found my stress level a little elevated and believe that the little boy had challenges in this environment as well.  But the teacher used positive re-direction to keep him on task.

I’m looking forward to visiting the school again in October.  At that time, I’ll get to work with my assigned buddy in the classroom.  This was a great introductory experience though.

• Students most often experience sexual harassment for the first time during sixth to ninth grade … but some instances occur before third grade.
• 91.5% of LGBT students report hearing homophobic remarks frequently or often at school—but 83% report that faculty never or only sometimes intervene when they overhear such remarks being made.

What can parents do??

1. Teach your children to speak up for themselves.  Self-confidence is the best weapon you can give them in the fight against harassment.
2. Talk to your child about their school day.  Don’t let them get away with school always being “fine.”  Ask about their friends, their problems, their teachers, their girl/boyfriend.
3. Be a good example.  Don’t laugh at sexist jokes or comments.  Try to use gender-exclusive language to be a role model for your teen.
4. Teach your child not to harass.  Instilling a sense of empathy and respect for others will prevent your child from hurting others.
5. Make sure that your teens know that past dating relationships can be a source for future sexual harassment.  Prepare them for the possibility and equip them with ideas to stop it.
6. Get a copy of the school sexual harassment policy.  Read it yourself and then discuss it with your teen.  By letting them know that you take these concerns seriously, you are bettering the chances that your teen will feel comfortable reporting instances of harassment.

Remember….you have the RIGHT and the RESPONSIBILITY to make sure your teenager is safe from violence and harassment at school.

• 81% of studens will experience some form of sexual harassment during their school lives.
• 40% of students report that teachers and other school employees sexually harass students in their school.

What can you do??

1. If someone harasses you, tell them they need to stop.  Tell them they are creeping you out or making you uncomfortable.
2. Tell an adult that you TRUST!  Be persistent if you aren’t taken seriously.  You should know that a school is REQUIRED BY LAW to listen to your claim and to take action.
3. Remember that sexual harassment is illegal.  And never tell yourself that it is your fault or that you deserve it.  Don’t ignore it.  It won’t go away unless you make it go away.
4. Even people you are dating or have dated can be guilty of sexual harassment.  Tell a trusted adult.  Past relationships are not a free ticket to future harassment.
5. Keep a journal of the incidents.  Not only will this help you remember the details when reporting the harasment, but journaling will help you get your feelings on paper.  If the person harassing you sends you emails, texts, tweets, or notes, KEEP THEM as evidence!
6. Don’t be an enabler!  If you see someone being harassed, tell an adult.

Your school has a sexual harassment policy.  Read it to know what behaviors are considered harassment and how to report if you experience harassment.