TFA - the villan, the savior, the man-made organization

As you may know, I am an incoming Teach For America (TFA) Corps member this year. For many people this means very little, other than I will be a teacher and that is cool.

Other folks, however think and speak differently about the organization.

The Villan

I have read enough anti-Teach For America arguments to know that there are embedded within the diatribes and finger-pointing some good points. However there are accusation about the short training time TFA teachers have over the summer, griping against fast turnover, complaining about how TFA is a capitalist plot to privatize education, and blatant rude generalizations that remind me of anti-mormon literature from the 1800s.

What I realized yet again?

The Savior

On the other hand, I have heard about some folks who talk as if TFA is the answer to many (if not all) problems. It is probably these kind of comments that fuel the "villan" response in people. I know I would get pretty angry if I had been teaching in a classroom for 20 years and then some kid who has never taught in his or her life walks in and says something like, "You should do your teaching my way, because I am TFA!" Thats just . . . dumb. Along this vein, I shudder to think that there could be some TFA corps members here because it is just a job and offers a nice launch pad into business etc.


Man-Made Organization That Just Wants to Do a Good Job and Actually Does Do a Pretty Good Job

Obviously the title of this little section will never be popular or cool because it is moderate and recognizes reality. The fact is that TFA is not a person, it isn't even a monster or a super hero. Teach For America is an organization full of all kinds of people. You might not believe it is true, but then again you might not believe there is such thing as a thoughtful male, a smart blonde, a Christ-loving Mormon, a kind Arab, a corrupt American, a school full of teachers cheating for their students, and all sorts of other facts that exist despite our stereo types and logical fallacies.

As educators we should and must be better than this.

I am proud to be a part of an organization where the corp member who drives this car . . . .

can proudly work and learn with the corp member who wrote this piece about private education.

Anyway, got to get ready for another week of learning, sweat, and tears.

Entering the Conversation

I asked a young student I know if they would be willing to write a short guest post for my blog. Check it out!

Have you ever read a book or seen a movie that you really liked? Some (or lots) of people have favorite books or movies that, as an 11 year old girl, I can relate to. I have been reading one of my favorite books lately. It's called The Hunger Games. In the book, a girl named Katniss lives in a place called panem. Panem is split up into twelve districts and each has a certain thing that they do. For instance, district 12 mines coal for fire in the capital. The capital is the ruling city. The capital people are always dressed quite weird, with wigs and tattoos all over their bodies. Katniss lives in district 12, her father had died in a mine explosion, and she has a best friend named Gale. The reaping is when all of district 12 population is gathered together and a boy and a girl's names are pulled from two glass balls. Two per district. The two "tributes" are taken to the capital to train and then they are placed in an arena to fight to the death...

The hunger games is a book that I will never stop loving. I think that if you where to try it that you would really like it too!:)

~ Sophie (San Diego, CA)

I think this short paragraph is a delightful piece of writing from a young person who is clearly interested in a piece of text. I wonder, however, how often anyone other than her teacher gets to read stuff like this! So that leads me to a question: why do we write multiple papers in school? From grade 2 or so all the way up to the graduate level, students draft and produce hundreds of papers. Obviously in the process they learn many things such as how to craft an argument, think through evidence in a logical way, and of course use correct grammar and punctuation.

But after that, is there any benefit to writing all these papers? I have spent countless hours, exhaustively slaving away at drafts and final copies of many papers - with my sole intention of getting a good grade and turning it in on time. You may be different (I hope you are!).  When I look back on these assignments that went from my hand to my teacher to the trash, I wonder if there couldn't have been a better way to treat my writing.

You may have heard of the "Burkean Parlor" - an analogy given by Kenneth Burke about how scholarly writing is like a conversation. The video below explains in case you need to brush up.

Why the analogy and video? Well, we need to do better at helping students learn from an early age that they have the ability, capacity, and skills to enter conversations. Rather than writing a paper that is read by just their teacher (and maybe a parent), students can engage in real conversations and can enter these arguments with their own evidence, writing, and perspective. What if the student above was able to submit this piece of writing about a book she loved to other students who could share their thoughts? Obviously safety and privacy are an important issue when working with minors, but it is possible.

How? Blogging is the most obvious, and many teachers are experimenting with that. Social media in general offers students the ability to discuss issues and offer evidence. These concepts aren't really new, and yet many people aren't aware of them.

What do you think? Is this is a good idea? Should dissertations, theses, or general papers in K-12 schools be geared towards larger discussions than just those in charge of the formal grades? I think so, but am curious about you. BTW, I may be very late in "the conversation" about the role of blogging in the classroom and perhaps I should do some more listening before sharing my thoughts.